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Title: Master tales of mystery, Volume 1 (of 3)
Author: Various
Editor: Francis J. Reynolds
Release date: January 29, 2026 [eBook #77811]
Language: English
Original publication: New York: P. F. Collier & Sun, 1889
Credits: Al Haines
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MASTER TALES OF MYSTERY, VOLUME 1 (OF 3) ***
[Frontispiece: A woman at his feet was clasping his knees in
thankfulness _Anna Katharine Green Room No. 3--p. 35_]
MASTER TALES
_of_
MYSTERY
BY THE WORLD'S MOST FAMOUS
AUTHORS OF TO-DAY
COLLECTED AND ARRANGED
BY FRANCIS J. REYNOLDS
VOLUME I
P. F. COLLIER & SON
PUBLISHERS NEW YORK
Copyright 1915
BY P. F. COLLIER & Son
Copyright 1912
BY ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
Copyright 1909, 1910
BY THE CROWELL PUBLISHING Co.
Copyright 1910
BY ABBOTT & BRIGGS, INC.
Copyright 1913
BY DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
Copyright 1896
BY DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
Copyright 1903
BY NEW YORK HERALD Co.
Copyright 1907
BY THE PEARSON PUB. Co.
Copyright 1908
BY THE METROPOLITAN MAGAZINE COMPANY
Copyright 1909
BY DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
Copyright 1889
BY DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
Copyright 1910
BY THE STORY-PRESS CORPORATION
_Entered at Stationers' Hall, London
All rights reserved_
Copyright 1913
BY WOMAN'S WORLD MAG. Co., INC.
Introduction
The keynote of the reader's interest in present-day fiction is
interest. No longer does the reader look for encyclopedic
information mixed thoroughly through the pages of his novel. If
information is wanted, the vast number of reference works found at
every hand supply it.
The first object of all fiction is not to instruct but to
entertain--to hold the reader's thoughts so enthralled by the plot of
the story that all else is for the time being forgotten.
Granted then that fiction unadorned by actual facts is the most
popular form of entertaining reading, what particular class of
fiction meets the greatest demand? Why does one author have a hundred
thousand readers and another a bare score? What makes the
circulation of one great magazine go bounding upward while its rival
struggles desperately to retain its few subscribers?
If one writer succeeds where another fails, if one publication grows
while another declines, it is because the successful novelist and the
popular magazine interest and entertain--have gained and hold their
audiences by the bonds of pure delight.
To-day by far the most popular form of fiction is that known as
Problem or Mystery Tales because it gives that added zest to
entertaining fiction by injecting into it the oft puzzling plots and
situations whose unravelings bring surprises at every turn. It has
been aptly said that the popularity of the problem tales is due to
the fact that the human mind in its daily toil is confronted by
naught else but problems--that problem succeeds problem with such
lightning rapidity that the mind's functions actually consist of
nothing but problem solutions. Vast mysteries surround us--vaster
still stretch just before our puny limits of conception. We are
constantly striving to solve something, whether it be the merest
trifle of the moment or some baffling problem that threatens to
overwhelm our powers.
Fiction that feeds this craving is fiction that we understand and
appreciate--it's our kind of story, it fits in with our moods.
Public taste is correct because it shows unmistakably the natural
cravings of the general reader for mystery and problem tales as
proven by their universal demand.
Mystery tales from Edgar Allan Poe through the decades that bring us
to the present-day writers have ever been the most thoroughly
interesting of all our fiction. Nor is this class of fiction
confined to our own language, as shown by the French Gaboriau and by
the Germans Hoffman, Richter, Tieck, and Chamisso, and their
followers.
In the past the masters of this type of story could be named on the
fingers of one hand--a small band of geniuses who, to a more or less
extent, contented themselves with following in the footsteps of the
first great master, Poe. He, while master of the many cruder
sciences of his day, drew only upon a scant few to furnish the
solutions to his mystery and problem tales, whereas to-day every
science has been linked to this vogue of stories--astronomy,
chemistry, physics, biology, medicine, geology, electricity--their
principles all called upon to serve in the solving of problems in the
realm of mystery tales.
In these volumes are gathered the preeminent mystery tales of
to-day--each a master tale of an era that has produced the greatest
ever penned.
F. J. REYNOLDS.
Contents
ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
Room No. 3
The Gray Lady
The Thief
Midnight in Beauchamp Row
The Little Steel Coils
The Staircase at Heart's Delight
HAROLD FREDERIC
The Path of Murtogh
SIR GILBERT PARKER
There is Sorrow on the Sea
S. R. CROCKETT
The Smugglers of the Clone
W. CLARK RUSSELL
That There Mason
MARY CHOLMONDELEY
The Hand on the Latch
FRANK R. STOCKTON
The Stories of the Three Burglars
WILLIAM HAMILTON OSBORNE
A Suspicious Character
JOHN A. MOROSO
Angelo
Room No. 3
BY ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
I
"What door is that? You've opened all the others; why do you pass
that one by?"
"Oh, that! That's only Number 3. A mere closet, gentlemen,"
responded the landlord in a pleasant voice. "To be sure, we
sometimes use it as a sleeping-room when we are hard pushed. Jake,
the clerk you saw below, used it last night. But it's not on our
regular list. Do you want a peep at it?"
"Most assuredly. As you know, it's our duty to see every room in
this house, whether it is on your regular list or not."
"All right. I haven't the key of this one with me. But--yes, I
have. There, gentlemen!" he cried, unlocking the door and holding it
open for them to look inside. "You see it no more answers the young
lady's description than the others do. And I haven't another to show
you. You have seen all those in front, and this is the last one in
the rear. You'll have to believe our story. The old lady never put
foot in this tavern."
The two men he addressed peered into the shadowy recesses before
them, and one of them, a tall and uncommonly good-looking young man
of stalwart build and unusually earnest manner, stepped softly
inside. He was a gentleman farmer living near, recently appointed
deputy sheriff on account of a recent outbreak of horse-stealing in
the neighborhood.
"I observe," he remarked, after a hurried glance about him, "that the
paper on these walls is not at all like that she describes. She was
very particular about the paper; said that it was of a muddy pink
color and had big scrolls on it which seemed to move and crawl about
in whirls as you looked at it. This paper is blue and striped.
Otherwise--
"Let's go below," suggested his companion, who, from the deference
with which his most casual word was received, was evidently a man of
some authority. "It's cold here, and there are several new questions
I should like to put to the young lady. Mr. Quimby,"--this to the
landlord, "I've no doubt you are right, but we'll give this poor girl
another chance. I believe in giving every one the utmost chance
possible."
"My reputation is in your hands, Coroner Golden," was the quiet
reply. Then, as they both turned, "my reputation against the word of
an obviously demented girl."
The words made their own echo. As the third man moved to follow the
other two into the hall, he seemed to catch this echo, for he
involuntarily cast another look behind him as if expectant of some
contradiction reaching him from the bare and melancholy walls he was
leaving. But no such contradiction came. Instead, he appeared to
read confirmation there of the landlord's plain and unembittered
statement. The dull blue paper with its old-fashioned and
uninteresting stripes seemed to have disfigured the walls for years.
It was not only grimy with age, but showed here and there huge
discolored spots, especially around the stovepipe-hole high up on the
left-hand side. Certainly he was a dreamer to doubt such plain
evidences as these. Yet--
Here his eye encountered Quimby's, and pulling himself up short, he
hastily fell into the wake of his comrade now hastening down the
narrow passage to the wider hall in front. Had it occurred to him to
turn again before rounding the corner--but no, I doubt if he would
have learned anything even then. The closing of a door by a careful
hand--the slipping up behind him of an eager and noiseless step--what
is there in these to re-awaken curiosity and fix suspicion? Nothing,
when the man concerned is Jacob Quimby; nothing. Better that he
failed to look back; it left his judgment freer for the question
confronting him in the room below.
Three Forks Tavern has been long forgotten, but at the time of which
I write it was a well-known but little-frequented house, situated
just back of the highway on the verge of the forest lying between the
two towns of Chester and Danton in southern Ohio. It was of ancient
build, and had all the picturesqueness of age and the English
traditions of its original builder. Though so near two thriving
towns, it retained its own quality of apparent remoteness from city
life and city ways. This in a measure was made possible by the
nearness of the woods which almost enveloped it; but the character of
the man who ran it had still more to do with it, his sympathies being
entirely with the old, and not at all with the new, as witness the
old-style glazing still retained in its ancient doorway. This, while
it appealed to a certain class of summer boarders, did not so much
meet the wants of the casual traveler, so that while the house might
from some reason or other be overfilled one night, it was just as
likely to be almost empty the next, save for the faithful few who
loved the woods and the ancient ways of the easy-mannered host and
his attentive, soft-stepping help. The building itself was of wooden
construction, high in front and low in the rear, with gables toward
the highway, projecting here and there above a strip of rude
old-fashioned carving. These gables were new, that is, they were
only a century old; the portion now called the extension, in the
passages of which we first found the men we have introduced to you,
was the original house. Then it may have enjoyed the sunshine and
air of the valley it overlooked, but now it was so hemmed in by yards
and out-buildings as to be considered the most undesirable part of
the house, and Number 3 the most undesirable of its rooms; which
certainly does not speak well for it.
But we are getting away from our new friends and their mysterious
errand. As I have already intimated, this tavern with the curious
name (a name totally unsuggestive, by the way, of its location on a
perfectly straight road) had for its southern aspect the road and a
broad expanse beyond of varied landscape which made the front rooms
cheerful even on a cloudy day; but it was otherwise with those in the
rear and on the north end. They were never cheerful, and especially
toward night were frequently so dark that artificial light was
resorted to as early as three o'clock in the afternoon. It was so
to-day in the remote parlor which these three now entered. A lamp
had been lit, though the daylight still struggled feebly in, and it
was in this conflicting light that there rose up before them the
vision of a woman, who seen at any time and in any place would have
drawn, if not held, the eye, but seen in her present attitude and at
such a moment of question and suspense, struck the imagination with a
force likely to fix her image forever in the mind, if not in the
heart, of a sympathetic observer.
I should like to picture her as she stood there, because the
impression she made at this instant determined the future action of
the man I have introduced to you as not quite satisfied with the
appearances he had observed above. Young, slender but vigorous, with
a face whose details you missed in the fire of her eye and the
wonderful red of her young, fresh but determined mouth, she stood, on
guard as it were, before a shrouded form on a couch at the far end of
the room. An imperative _Keep back!_ spoke in her look, her
attitude, and the silent gesture of one outspread hand, but it was
the _Keep back!_ of love, not of fear, the command of an outraged
soul, conscious of its rights and instinctively alert to maintain
them.
The landlord at sight of the rebuke thus given to their intrusion,
stepped forward with a conciliatory bow.
"I beg pardon," said he, "but these gentlemen, Doctor Golden, the
coroner from Chester, and Mr. Hammersmith, wish to ask you a few more
questions about your mother's death. You will answer them, I am
sure."
Slowly her eyes moved till they met those of the speaker.
"I am anxious to do so," said she, in a voice rich with many
emotions. But seeing the open compassion in the landlord's face, the
color left her cheeks, almost her lips, and drawing back the hand
which she had continued to hold outstretched, she threw a glance of
helpless inquiry about her which touched the younger man's heart and
induced him to say:
"The truth should not be hard to find in a case like this. I'm sure
the young lady can explain. Doctor Golden, are you ready for her
story?"
The coroner, who had been silent up till now, probably from sheer
surprise at the beauty and simple, natural elegance of the woman
caught, as he believed, in a net of dreadful tragedy, roused himself
at this direct question, and bowing with an assumption of dignity far
from encouraging to the man and woman anxiously watching him, replied:
"We will hear what she has to say, of course, but the facts are well
known. The woman she calls mother was found early this morning lying
on her face in the adjoining woods quite dead. She had fallen over a
half-concealed root, and with such force that she never moved again.
If her daughter was with her at the time, then that daughter fled
without attempting to raise her. The condition and position of the
wound on the dead woman's forehead, together with such corroborative
facts as have since come to light, preclude all argument on this
point. But we'll listen to the young woman, notwithstanding; she has
a right to speak, and she shall speak. Did not your mother die in
the woods? No hocus-pocus, miss, but the plain unvarnished truth."
"Sirs,"--the term was general, but her appeal appeared to be directed
solely to the one sympathetic figure before her, "if my mother died
in the wood--and, for all I can say, she may have done so--it was not
till after she had been in this house. She arrived in my company,
and was given a room. I saw the room and I saw her in it. I cannot
be deceived in this. If I am, then my mind has suddenly failed
me;--something which I find it hard to believe."
"Mr. Quimby, did Mrs. Demarest come to the house with Miss Demarest?"
inquired Mr. Hammersmith of the silent landlord.
"She says so," was the reply, accompanied by a compassionate shrug
which spoke volumes. "And I am quite sure she means it," he added,
with kindly emphasis. "But ask Jake, who was in the office all the
evening. Ask my wife, who saw the young lady to her room. Ask
anybody and everybody who was around the tavern last night. I'm not
the only one to say that Miss Demarest came in alone. All will tell
you that she arrived here without escort of any kind; declined
supper, but wanted a room, and when I hesitated to give it to her,
said by way of explanation of her lack of a companion that she had
had trouble in Chester and had left town very hurriedly for her home.
That her mother was coming to meet her and would probably arrive here
very soon. That when this occurred I was to notify her; but if a
gentleman called instead, I was to be very careful not to admit that
any such person as herself was in the house. Indeed, to avoid any
such possibility she prayed that her name might be left off the
register--a favor which I was slow in granting her, but which I
finally did, as you can see for yourselves."
"Oh!" came in indignant exclamation from the young woman before them.
"I understand my position now. This man has a bad conscience. He
has something to hide, or he would not take to lying about little
things like that. I never asked him to allow me to leave my name off
the register. On the contrary I wrote my name in it and my mother's
name, too. Let him bring the book here and you will see."
"We have seen," responded the coroner. "We looked in the register
ourselves. Your names are not there."
The flush of indignation which had crimsoned her cheeks faded till
she looked as startling and individual in her pallor as she had the
moment before in her passionate bloom.
"Not there?" fell from her lips in a frozen monotone as her eyes grew
fixed upon the faces before her and her hand went groping around for
some support.
Mr. Hammersmith approached with a chair.
"Sit," he whispered. Then, as she sank slowly into an attitude of
repose, he added gently, "You shall have every consideration. Only
tell the truth, the exact truth without any heightening from your
imagination, and, above all, don't be frightened."
She may have heard his words, but she gave no sign of comprehending
them. She was following the movements of the landlord, who had
slipped out to procure the register, and now stood holding it out
toward the coroner.
"Let her see for herself," he suggested, with a bland, almost
fatherly, air.
Doctor Golden took the book and approached Miss Demarest.
"Here is a name very unlike yours," he pointed out, as her eye fell
on the page he had opened to. "Annette Colvin, Lansing, Michigan."
"That is not my name or writing," said she.
"There is room below it for your name and that of your mother, but
the space is blank, do you see?"
"Yes, yes, I see," she admitted. "Yet I wrote my name in the book!
Or is it all a monstrous dream!"
The coroner returned the book to the landlord.
"Is this your only book?" he asked.
"The only book."
Miss Demarest's eyes flashed. Hammersmith, who had watched this
scene with intense interest, saw, or believed that he saw, in this
flash the natural indignation of a candid mind face to face with
arrant knavery. But when he forced himself to consider the
complacent Quimby he did not know what to think. His aspect of
self-confidence equaled hers. Indeed, he showed the greater poise.
Yet her tones rang true as she cried:
"You made up one plausible story, and you may well make up another.
I demand the privilege of relating the whole occurrence as I remember
it," she continued with an appealing look in the one sympathetic
direction. "Then you can listen to him."
"We desire nothing better," returned the coroner.
"I shall have to mention a circumstance very mortifying to myself,"
she proceeded, with a sudden effort at self-control, which commanded
the admiration even of the coroner. "My one adviser is dead," here
her eyes flashed for a moment toward the silent form behind her. "If
I make mistakes, if I seem unwomanly--but you have asked for the
truth and you shall have it, all of it. I have no father. Since
early this morning I have had no mother. But when I had, I found it
my duty to work for her as well as for myself, that she might have
the comforts she had been used to and could no longer afford. For
this purpose I sought a situation in Chester, and found one in a
family I had rather not name." A momentary tremor, quickly
suppressed, betrayed the agitation which this allusion cost her. "My
mother lived in Danton (the next town to the left). Anybody there
will tell you what a good woman she was. I had wished her to live in
Chester (that is, at first; later, I--I was glad she didn't), but she
had been born in Danton, and could not accustom herself to strange
surroundings. Once a week I went home, and once a week, usually on a
Wednesday, she would come and meet me on the highroad, for a little
visit. Once we met here, but this is a circumstance no one seems to
remember. I was very fond of my mother and she of me. Had I loved
no one else, I should have been happy still, and not been obliged to
face strangers over her body and bare the secrets of my heart to
preserve my good name. There is a man, he seems a thousand miles
away from me now, so much have I lived since yesterday. He--he lived
in the house where I did--was one of the family--always at
table--always before my eyes. He fancied me. I--I might have
fancied him had he been a better man. But he was far from being of
the sort my mother approved, and when he urged his suit too far, I
grew frightened and finally ran away. It was not so much that I
could not trust him," she bravely added after a moment of silent
confusion, "but that I could not trust myself. He had an unfortunate
influence over me, which I hated while I half yielded to it."
"You ran away. When was this?"
"Yesterday afternoon at about six. He had vowed that he would see me
again before the evening was over, and I took that way to prevent a
meeting. There was no other so simple,--or such was my thought at
the time. I did not dream that sorrows awaited me in this quiet
tavern, and perplexities so much greater than any which could have
followed a meeting with him that I feel my reason fail when I
contemplate them."
"Go on," urged the coroner, after a moment of uneasy silence. "Let
us hear what happened after you left your home in Chester."
"I went straight to the nearest telegraph office, and sent a message
to my mother. I told her I was coming home, and for her to meet me
on the road near this tavern. Then I went to Hudson's and had
supper, for I had not eaten before leaving my employer's. The sun
had set when I finally started, and I walked fast so as to reach
Three Forks before dark. If my mother had got the telegram at once,
which I calculated on her doing, as she lived next door to the
telegraph office in Danton, she would be very near this place on my
arrival here. So I began to look for her as soon as I entered the
woods. But I did not see her. I came as far as the tavern door, and
still I did not see her. But farther on, just where the road turns
to cross the railroad-track, I spied her coming, and ran to meet her.
She was glad to see me, but asked many questions which I had some
difficulty in answering. She saw this, and held me to the matter
till I had satisfied her. When this was done it was late and cold,
and we decided to come to the tavern for the night. And we came!
Nothing shall ever make me deny so positive a fact. We came, and
this man received us."
With her final repetition of this assertion, she rose and now stood
upright, with her finger pointing straight at Quimby. Had he cringed
or let his eyes waver from hers by so much as a hair's breadth, her
accusation would have stood and her cause been won. But not a
flicker disturbed the steady patience of his look, and Hammersmith,
who had made no effort to hide his anxiety to believe her story,
showed his disappointment with equal frankness as he asked:
"Who else was in the office? Surely Mr. Quimby was not there alone?"
She reseated herself before answering. Hammersmith could see the
effort she made to recall that simple scene. He found himself trying
to recall it, too--the old-fashioned, smoke-begrimed office, with its
one long window toward the road and the glass-paned door leading into
the hall of entrance. They had come in by that door and crossed to
the bar, which was also the desk in this curious old hostelry. He
could see them standing there in the light of possibly a solitary
lamp, the rest of the room in shadow unless a game of checkers were
on, which evidently was not so on this night. Had she turned her
head to peer into those shadows? It was not likely. She was
supported by her mother's presence, and this she was going to say.
By some strange telepathy that he would have laughed at a few hours
before, he feels confident of her words before she speaks. Yet he
listens intently as she finally looks up and answers:
"There was a man, I am sure there was a man somewhere at the other
end of the office. But I paid no attention to him. I was bargaining
for two rooms and registering my name and that of my mother."
"Two rooms; why two? You are not a fashionable young lady to require
a room alone."
"Gentlemen, I was tired. I had been through a wearing half-hour. I
knew that if we occupied the same room or even adjoining ones that
nothing could keep us from a night of useless and depressing
conversation. I did not feel equal to it, so I asked for two rooms a
short distance apart."
An explanation which could at least be accepted. Mr. Hammersmith
felt an increase of courage and scarcely winced as his colder-blooded
companion continued this unofficial examination by asking:
"Where were you standing when making these arrangements with Mr.
Quimby?"
"Right before the desk."
"And your mother?"
"She was at my left and a little behind me. She was a shy woman. I
usually took the lead when we were together."
"Was she veiled?" the coroner continued quietly.
"I think so. She had been crying--" The bereaved daughter paused.
"But don't you know?"
"My impression is that her veil was down when we came into the room.
She may have lifted it as she stood there. I know that it was lifted
as we went upstairs. I remember feeling glad that the lamps gave so
poor a light, she looked so distressed."
"Physically, do you mean, or mentally?"
Mr. Hammersmith asked this question. It seemed to rouse some new
train of thought in the girl's mind. For a minute she looked
intently at the speaker, then she replied in a disturbed tone:
"Both. I wonder----" Here her thought wavered and she ceased.
"Go on," ordered the coroner impatiently. "Tell your story. It
contradicts that of the landlord in almost every point, but we've
promised to hear it out, and we will."
Rousing, she hastened to obey him.
"Mr. Quimby told the truth when he said that he asked me if I would
have supper, also when he repeated what I said about a gentleman, but
not when he declared that I wished to be told if my mother should
come and ask for me. My mother was at my side all the time we stood
there talking, and I did not need to make any requests concerning
her. When we went to our rooms a woman accompanied us. He says she
is his wife. I should like to see that woman."
"I am here, miss," spoke up a voice from a murky corner no one had
thought of looking in till now.
Miss Demarest at once rose, waiting for the woman to come forward.
This she did with a quick, natural step which insensibly prepared the
mind for the brisk, assertive woman who now presented herself. Mr.
Hammersmith, at sight of her open, not unpleasing face, understood
for the first time the decided attitude of the coroner. If this
woman corroborated her husband's account, the poor young girl, with
her incongruous beauty and emotional temperament, would not have much
show. He looked to see her quailing now. But instead of that she
stood firm, determined, and feverishly beautiful.
"Let her tell you what took place upstairs," she cried. "She showed
us the rooms and carried water afterward to the one my mother
occupied."
"I am sorry to contradict the young lady," came in even tones from
the unembarrassed, motherly looking woman thus appealed to. "She
thinks that her mother was with her and that I conducted this mother
to another room after showing her to her own. I don't doubt in the
least that she has worked herself up to the point of absolutely
believing this. But the facts are these: She came alone and went to
her room unattended by any one but myself. And what is more, she
seemed entirely composed at the time, and I never thought of
suspecting the least thing wrong. Yet her mother lay all that time
in the wood--"
"Silence!"
This word was shot at her by Miss Demarest, who had risen to her full
height and now fairly flamed upon them all in her passionate
indignation. "I will not listen to such words till I have finished
all I have to say and put these liars to the blush. My mother was
with me, and this woman witnessed our good-night embrace, and then
showed my mother to her own room. I watched them going. They went
down the hall to the left and around a certain corner. I stood
looking after them till they turned this corner, then I closed my
door and began to take off my hat. But I wasn't quite satisfied with
the good-night which had passed between my poor mother and myself,
and presently I opened my door and ran down the hall and around the
corner on a chance of finding her room. I don't remember very well
how that hall looked. I passed several doors seemingly shut for the
night, and should have turned back, confused, if at that moment I had
not spied the landlady's figure, your figure, madam, coming out of
one room on your way to another. You were carrying a pitcher, and I
made haste and ran after you and reached the door just before you
turned to shut it. Can you deny that, or that you stepped aside
while I ran in and gave my mother another hug? If you can and do,
then you are a dangerous and lying woman, or I-- But I won't admit
that I'm not all right. It is you, base and untruthful woman, who
for some end I cannot fathom persist in denying facts on which my
honor, if not my life, depends. Why, gentlemen, you, one of you at
least, have heard me describe the very room in which I saw my mother.
It is imprinted on my mind. I didn't know at the time that I took
especial notice of it, but hardly a detail escaped me. The paper on
the wall--"
"We have been looking through the rooms," interpolated the coroner.
"We do not find any papered with the muddy pink you talk about."
She stared, drew back from them all, and finally sank into a chair.
"You do not find-- But you have not been shown them all."
"I think so."
"You have not. There is such a room. I could not have dreamed it."
Silence met this suggestion.
Throwing up her hands like one who realizes for the first time that
the battle is for life, she let an expression of her despair and
desolation rush in frenzy from her lips:
"It's a conspiracy. The whole thing is a conspiracy. If my mother
had had money on her or had worn valuable jewelry, I should believe
her to have been a victim of this lying man and woman. As it is, I
don't trust them. They say that my poor mother was found lying ready
dressed and quite dead in the wood. That may be true, for I saw men
bringing her in. But if so, what warrant have we that she was not
lured there, slaughtered, and made to seem the victim of accident by
this unscrupulous man and woman? Such things have been done; but for
a daughter to fabricate such a plot as they impute to me is past
belief, out of Nature and impossible. With all their wiles, they
cannot prove it. I dare them to do so; I dare any one to do so."
Then she begged to be allowed to search the house for the room she so
well remembered. "When I show you that," she cried, with ringing
assurance, "you will believe the rest of my story."
"Shall I take the young lady up myself?" asked Mr. Quimby. "Or will
it be enough if my wife accompanies her?"
"We will all accompany her," said the coroner.
"Very good," came in hearty acquiescence.
"It's the only way to quiet her," he whispered in Mr. Hammersmith's
ear.
The latter turned on him suddenly.
"None of your insinuations," he cried. "She's as far from insane as
I am myself. We shall find the room."
"You, too," fell softly from the other's lips as he stepped "back
into the coroner's wake. Mr. Hammersmith gave his arm to Miss
Demarest, and the landlady brought up the rear.
"Upstairs," ordered the trembling girl. "We will go first to the
room I occupied."
As they reached the door, she motioned them all back, and started
away from them down the hall. Quickly they followed. "It was around
a corner," she muttered broodingly, halting at the first turning.
"That is all I remember. But we'll visit every room."
"We have already," objected the coroner, but meeting Mr.
Hammersmith's warning look, he desisted from further interference.
"I remember its appearance perfectly. I remember it as if it were my
own," she persisted, as door after door was thrown back and as
quickly shut again at a shake of her head. "Isn't there another
hall? Might I not have turned some other corner?"
"Yes, there is another hall," acquiesced the landlord, leading the
way into the passage communicating with the extension.
"Oh!" she murmured, as she noted the increased interest in both the
coroner and his companion; "we shall find it here."
"Do you recognize the hall?" asked the coroner as they stepped
through a narrow opening into the old part.
"No, but I shall recognize the room."
"Wait!" It was Hammersmith who called her back as she was starting
forward. "I should like you to repeat just how much furniture this
room contained and where it stood."
She stopped, startled, and then said:
"It was awfully bare; a bed was on the left--"
"On the left?"
"She said the left," quoth the landlord, "though I don't see that it
matters; it's all fancy with her."
"Go on," kindly urged Hammersmith.
"There was a window. I saw the dismal panes and my mother standing
between them and me. I can't describe the little things."
"Possibly because there were none to describe," whispered Hammersmith
in his superior's ear.
Meanwhile the landlord and his wife awaited their advance with
studied patience. As Miss Demarest joined him, he handed her a bunch
of keys, with the remark:
"None of these rooms are occupied to-day, so you can open them
without hesitation."
She stared at him and ran quickly forward. Mr. Hammersmith followed
speedily after. Suddenly both paused. She had lost the thread of
her intention before opening a single door.
"I thought I could go straight to it," she declared. "I shall have
to open all the doors, as we did in the other hall."
"Let me help you," proffered Mr. Hammersmith. She accepted his aid,
and the search recommenced with the same results as before. Hope
sank to disappointment as each door was passed. The vigor of her
step was gone, and as she paused heartsick before the last and only
remaining door, it was with an ashy face she watched Mr. Hammersmith
stoop to insert the key.
He, on his part, as the door fell back, watched her for some token of
awakened interest. But he watched in vain. The smallness of the
room, its bareness, its one window, the absence of all furniture save
the solitary cot drawn up on the right (not on the left, as she had
said), seemed to make little or no impression on her.
"The last! the last! and I have not found it. Oh, sir," she moaned,
catching at Mr. Hammersmith's arm, "am I then mad? Was it a dream?
Or is this a dream? I feel that I no longer know." Then, as the
landlady officiously stepped up, she clung with increased frenzy to
Mr. Hammersmith, crying, with positive wildness, "This is the dream!
The room I remember is a real one and my story is real. Prove it, or
my reason will leave me. I feel it going--going--"
"Hush!" It was Hammersmith who sought thus to calm her. "Your story
is real and I will prove it so. Meanwhile trust your reason. It
will not fail you."
He had observed the corners of the landlord's hitherto restrained
lips settle into a slightly sarcastic curl as the door of this room
closed for the second time.
II
"The girl's beauty has imposed on you."
"I don't think so. I should be sorry to think myself so weak. I
simply credit her story more than I do that of Quimby."
"But his is supported by several witnesses. Hers has no support at
all."
"That is what strikes me as so significant. This man Quimby
understands himself. Who are his witnesses? His wife and his head
man. There is nobody else. In the half-hour which has just passed I
have searched diligently for some disinterested testimony supporting
his assertion, but I have found none. No one knows anything. Of the
three persons occupying rooms in the extension last night, two were
asleep and the third overcome with drink. The maids won't talk.
They seem uneasy, and I detected a sly look pass from the one to the
other at some question I asked, but they won't talk. There's a
conspiracy somewhere. I'm as sure of it as that I am standing here."
"Nonsense! What should there be a conspiracy about? You would make
this old woman an important character. Now we know that she wasn't.
Look at the matter as it presents itself to an unprejudiced mind. A
young and susceptible girl falls in love with a man, who is at once a
gentleman and a scamp. She may have tried to resist her feelings,
and she may not have. Your judgment and mine would probably differ
on this point. What she does not do is to let her mother into her
confidence. She sees the man--runs upon him, if you will, in places
or under circumstances she cannot avoid--till her judgment leaves her
and the point of catastrophe is reached. Then, possibly, she
awakens, or what is more probable, seeks to protect herself from the
penetration and opposition of his friends by meetings less open that
those in which they had lately indulged. She says that she left the
house to escape seeing him again last night. But this is not true.
On the contrary, she must have given him to understand where she was
going, for she had an interview with him in the woods before she came
upon her mother. He acknowledges to the interview. I have just had
a talk with him over the telephone."
"Then you know his name?"
"Yes, of course, she had to tell me. It's young Maxwell. I
suspected it from the first."
"Maxwell!" Mr. Hammersmith's cheek showed an indignant color. Or
was it a reflection from the setting sun? "You called him a scamp a
few minutes ago. A scamp's word isn't worth much."
"No, but it's evidence when on oath, and I fancy he will swear to the
interview."
"Well, well, say there was an interview."
"It changes things, Mr. Hammersmith. It changes things. It makes
possible a certain theory of mine which accounts for all the facts."
"It does!"
"Yes. I don't think this girl is really responsible. I don't
believe she struck her mother or is deliberately telling a tissue of
lies to cover up some dreadful crime. I consider her the victim of a
mental hallucination, the result of some great shock. Now what was
the shock? I'll tell you. This is how I see it, how Mr. Quimby sees
it, and such others in the house as have ventured an opinion. She
was having this conversation with her love in the woods below here
when her mother came in sight. Surprised, for she had evidently not
expected her mother to be so prompt, she hustled her lover off and
hastened to meet the approaching figure. But it was too late. The
mother had seen the man, and in the excitement of the discovery and
the altercation which undoubtedly followed, made such a sudden move,
possibly of indignant departure, that her foot was caught by one of
the roots protruding at this point and she fell her whole length and
with such violence as to cause immediate death. Now, Mr.
Hammersmith, stop a minute and grasp the situation. If, as I believe
at this point in the inquiry, Miss Demarest had encountered a
passionate opposition to her desires from this upright and thoughtful
mother, the spectacle of this mother lying dead before her, with all
opposition gone and the way cleared in an instant to her wishes, but
cleared in a manner which must haunt her to her own dying day, was
enough to turn a brain already heated with contending emotions.
Fancies took the place of facts, and by the time she reached this
house had so woven themselves into a concrete form that no word she
now utters can be relied on. This is how I see it, Mr. Hammersmith,
and it is on this basis I shall act."
Hammersmith made an effort and, nodding slightly, said in a
restrained tone:
"Perhaps you are justified. I have no wish to force my own ideas
upon you; they are much too vague at present. I will only suggest
that this is not the first time the attention of the police has been
drawn to this house by some mysterious occurrence. You remember the
Stevens case? There must have been notes to the amount of seven
thousand dollars in the pile he declared had been taken from him some
time during the day and night he lodged here."
"Stevens! I remember something about it. But they couldn't locate
the theft here. The fellow had been to the fair in Chester all day
and couldn't swear that he had seen his notes after leaving the
grounds."
"I know. But he always looked on Quimby as the man. Then there is
the adventure of little Miss Thistlewaite."
"I don't remember that."
"It didn't get into the papers; but it was talked about in the
neighborhood. She is a quaint one, full of her crotchets, but
clear--clear as a bell where her interests are involved. She took a
notion to spend a summer here--in this house, I mean. She had a room
in one of the corners overlooking the woods, and professing to prefer
Nature to everything else, was happy enough till she began to miss
things--rings, pins, a bracelet and, finally, a really valuable
chain. She didn't complain at first--the objects were trivial, and
she herself somewhat to blame for leaving them lying around in her
room, often without locking the door. But when the chain went, the
matter became serious, and she called Mr. Quimby's attention to her
losses. He advised her to lock her door, which she was careful to do
after that, but not with the expected result. She continued to miss
things, mostly jewelry of which she had a ridiculous store. Various
domestics were dismissed, and finally one of the permanent boarders
was requested to leave, but still the thefts went on till, her
patience being exhausted, she notified the police and a detective was
sent: I have always wished I had been that detective. The case ended
in what was always considered a joke. Another object disappeared
while he was there, and it having been conclusively proved to him
that it could not have been taken by way of the door, he turned his
attention to the window which it was one of her freaks always to keep
wide open. The result was curious. One day he spied from a
hiding-place he had made in the bushes a bird flying out from that
window, and following the creature till she alighted in her nest he
climbed the tree and searched that nest. It was encrusted with
jewels. The bird was a magpie and had followed its usual habits,
but--the chain was not there, nor one or two other articles of
decided value. Nor were they ever found. The bird bore the blame;
the objects missing were all heavy and might have been dropped in its
flight, but I have always thought that the bird had an accomplice, a
knowing fellow who understood what's what and how to pick out his
share."
The coroner smiled. There was little conviction and much sarcasm in
that smile. Hammersmith turned away. "Have you any instructions for
me?" he said.
"Yes, you had better stay here. I will return in the morning with my
jury. It won't take long after that to see this thing through."
The look he received in reply was happily hidden from him.
III
"Yes, I'm going to stay here to-night. As it's a mere formality, I
shall want a room to sit in, and if you have no objection I'll take
Number 3 on the rear corridor."
"I'm sorry, but Number 3 is totally unfit for use, as you've already
seen."
"Oh, I'm not particular. Put a table in and a good light, and I'll
get along with the rest. I have something to do. Number 3 will
answer."
The landlord shifted his feet, cast a quick scrutinizing look at the
other's composed face, and threw back his head with a quick laugh.
"As you will. I can't make you comfortable on such short notice, but
that's your lookout. I've several other rooms vacant."
"I fancy that room," was all the reply he got.
Mr. Quimby at once gave his orders. They were received by Jake with
surprise.
Fifteen minutes later Hammersmith prepared to install himself in
these desolate quarters. But before doing so he walked straight to
the small parlor where he had last seen Miss Demarest and, knocking,
asked for the privilege of a word with her. It was not her figure,
however, which appeared in the doorway, but that of the landlady.
"Miss Demarest is not here," announced that buxom and smooth-tongued
woman. "She was like to faint after you gentlemen left the room, and
I just took her upstairs to a quiet place by herself."
"On the rear corridor?"
"Oh, no, sir; a nice front room; we don't consider money in a case
like this."
"Will you give me its number?"
Her suave and steady look changed to one of indignation.
"You're asking a good deal, aren't you? I doubt if the young lady--"
"The number, if you please," he quietly put in.
"Thirty-two," she snapped out. "She will have every care," she
hastened to assure him as he turned away.
"I've no doubt. I do not intend to sleep to-night; if the young lady
is worse, you will communicate the fact to me. You will find me in
Number 3."
He had turned back to make this reply, and was looking straight at
her as the number dropped from his lips. It did not disturb her set
smile, but in some inscrutable way all meaning seemed to leave that
smile, and she forgot to drop her hand which had been stretched out
in an attempted gesture.
"Number 3," he repeated. "Don't forget, madam."
The injunction seemed superfluous. She had not dropped her hand when
he wheeled around once more in taking the turn at the foot of the
staircase.
Jake and a very sleepy maid were on the floor above when he reached
it. He paid no attention to Jake, but he eyed the girl somewhat
curiously. She was comparatively a new domestic in the tavern,
having been an inmate there for only three weeks. He had held a few
minutes' conversation with her during the half-hour of secret inquiry
in which he had previously indulged and he remembered some of her
careful answers, also the air of fascination with which she had
watched him all the time they were together. He had made nothing of
her then, but the impression had remained that she was the one
hopeful source of knowledge in the house. Now she looked dull and
moved about in Jake's wake like an automaton. Yet Hammersmith made
up his mind to speak to her as soon as the least opportunity offered.
"Where is 32?" he asked as he moved away from them in the opposite
direction from the course they were taking.
"I thought you were to have room Number 3," blurted out Jake.
"I am. But where is 32?"
"Round there," said she. "A lady's in there now. The one--"
"Come on," urged Jake. "Huldah, you may go now. I'll show the
gentleman his room."
Huldah dropped her head, and began to move off, but not before
Hammersmith had caught her eye.
"Thirty-two," he formed with his lips, showing her a scrap of paper
which he held in his hand.
He thought she nodded, but he could not be sure. Nevertheless, he
ventured to lay the scrap down on a small table he was passing, and
when he again looked back, saw that it was gone and Huldah with it.
But whither, he could not be quite sure. There was always a risk in
these attempts, and he only half trusted the girl. She might carry
it to 32, and she might carry it to Quimby. In the first case, Miss
Demarest would know that she had an active and watchful friend in the
house; in the other, the dubious landlord would but receive an open
instead of veiled intimation that the young deputy had his eye on him
and was not to be fooled by appearances and the lack of evidence to
support his honest convictions.
They had done little more than he had suggested to make Number 3
habitable. As the door swung open under Jake's impatient hand, the
half-lighted hollow of the almost empty room gaped uninvitingly
before them, with just a wooden-bottomed chair and a rickety table
added to the small cot-bed which had been almost its sole furnishing
when he saw it last. The walls, bare as his hand, stretched without
relief from base-board to ceiling, and the floor from door to window
showed an unbroken expanse of unpainted boards, save for the narrow
space between chair and table, where a small rug had been laid. A
cheerless outlook for a tired man, but it seemed to please
Hammersmith. There was paper and ink on the table, and the lamp
which he took care to examine held oil enough to last till morning.
With a tray of eatables, this ought to suffice, or so his manner
conveyed, and Jake, who had already supplied the eatables, was
backing slowly out when his eye, which seemingly against his will had
been traveling curiously up and down the walls, was caught by that of
Hammersmith, and he plunged from the room, with a flush visible even
in that half light.
It was a trivial circumstance, but it fitted in with Hammersmith's
trend of thought at the moment, and when the man was gone he stood
for several minutes with his own eye traveling up and down those
dusky walls in an inquiry which this distant inspection did not seem
thoroughly to satisfy, for in another instant he had lifted a glass
of water from the tray and, going to the nearest wall, began to
moisten the paper at one of the edges. When it was quite wet, he
took out his penknife, but before using it, he looked behind him,
first at the door, and then at the window. The door was shut; the
window seemingly guarded by an outside blind; but the former was not
locked, and the latter showed, upon closer inspection, a space
between the slats which he did not like. Crossing to the door, he
carefully turned the key, then proceeding to the window, he
endeavored to throw up the sash in order to close the blinds more
effectually. But he found himself balked in the attempt. The cord
had been cut and the sash refused to move under his hand.
Casting a glance of mingled threat and sarcasm out into the night, he
walked back to the wall and, dashing more water over the spot he had
already moistened, began to pick at the loosened edges of the paper
which were slowly falling away. The result was a disappointment; how
great a disappointment he presently realized, as his knife-point
encountered only plaster under the peeling edges of the paper. He
had hoped to find other paper under the blue--the paper which Miss
Demarest remembered--and not finding it, was conscious of a sinking
of the heart which had never attended any of his miscalculations
before. Were his own feelings involved in this matter? It would
certainly seem so.
Astonished at his own sensations, he crossed back to the table, and
sinking into the chair beside it, endeavored to call up his common
sense, or at least shake himself free from the glamour which had
seized him. But this especial sort of glamour is not so easily
shaken off. Minutes passed--an hour, and little else filled his
thoughts than the position of this bewitching girl and the claims she
had on his sense of justice. If he listened, it was to hear her
voice raised in appeal at his door. If he closed his eyes, it was to
see her image more plainly on the background of his consciousness.
The stillness into which the house had sunk aided this absorption and
made his battle a losing one. There was naught to distract his mind,
and when he dozed, as he did for a while after midnight, it was to
fall under the conjuring effect of dreams in which her form dominated
with all the force of an unfettered fancy. The pictures which his
imagination thus brought before him were startling and never to be
forgotten. The first was that of an angry sea in the blue light of
an arctic winter. Stars flecked the zenith and shed a pale lustre on
the moving ice-floes hurrying toward a horizon of skurrying clouds
and rising waves. On one of those floes stood a woman alone, with
face set toward her death.
The scene changed. A desert stretched out before him. Limitless,
with the blazing colors of the arid sand topped by a cloudless sky,
it revealed but one suggestion of life in its herbless; waterless,
shadowless solitude. She stood in the midst of this desert, and as
he had seen her sway on the ice-floe, so he saw her now stretching
unavailing arms to the brazen heavens and sink--No! it was not a
desert, it was not a sea, ice-bound or torrid, it was a toppling
city, massed against impenetrable night one moment, then shown to its
awful full the next by the sudden tearing through of
lightning-flashes. He saw it all--houses, churches, towers, erect
and with steadfast line, a silhouette of quiet rest awaiting dawn;
then at a flash, the doom, the quake, the breaking down of outline,
the caving in of walls, followed by the sickening collapse in which
life, wealth, and innumerable beating human hearts went down into the
unseen and unknowable. He saw and he heard, but his eyes clung to
but one point, his ears listened for but one cry. There at the
extremity of a cornice, clinging to a bending beam, was the figure
again--the woman of the ice-floe and the desert. She seemed nearer
now. He could see the straining muscles of her arm, the white
despair of her set features. He wished to call aloud to her not to
look down--then, as the sudden darkness yielded to another
illuminating gleam, his mind changed and he would fain have begged
her to look, slip, and end all, for subtly, quietly, ominously
somewhere below her feet, he had caught the glimpsing of a feathery
line of smoke curling up from the lower debris. Flame was there; a
creeping devil which soon--
Horror! it was no dream! He was awake, he, Hammersmith, in this
small solitary hotel in Ohio, and there was fire, real fire in the
air, and in his ears the echo of a shriek such as a man hears but few
times in his life, even if his lot casts him continually among the
reckless and the suffering. Was it _hers_? Had these dreams been
forerunners of some menacing danger? He was on his feet, his eyes
staring at the floor beneath him, through the cracks of which wisps
of smoke were forcing their way up. The tavern was not only on fire,
_but on fire directly under him_. This discovery woke him
effectually. He bounded to the door; it would not open. He wrenched
at the key; but it would not turn, it was hampered in the lock.
Drawing back, he threw his whole weight against the panels, uttering
loud cries for help. The effort was useless. No yielding in the
door, no rush to his assistance from without. Aroused now to his
danger--reading the signs of the broken cord and hampered lock only
too well--he desisted from his vain attempts and turned desperately
toward the window. Though it might be impossible to hold up the sash
and crawl under it at the same time, his only hope of exit lay there,
as well as his only means of surviving the inroad of smoke which was
fast becoming unendurable. He would break the sash and seek escape
that way. They had doomed him to death, but he could climb roofs
like a cat and feared nothing when once relieved from this smoke.
Catching up the chair, he advanced toward the window.
But before reaching it he paused. It was not only he they sought to
destroy, but the room. There was evidence of crime in the room. In
that moment of keenly aroused intelligence he felt sure of it. What
was to be done? How could he save the room, and, by these means,
save himself and her? A single glance about assured him that he
could not save it. The boards under his feet were hot. Glints of
yellow light streaking through the shutters showed that the lower
story had already burst into flame. The room must go and with it
every clue to the problem which was agitating him. Meanwhile, his
eyeballs were smarting, his head growing dizzy. No longer sure of
his feet, he staggered over to the wall and was about to make use of
its support in his effort to reach the window, when his eyes fell on
the spot from which he had peeled the paper, and he came to a sudden
standstill. A bit of pink was showing under one edge of the blue.
Dropping the chair which he still held, he fumbled for his knife,
found it, made a dash at that wall, and for a few frenzied moments
worked at the plaster till he had hacked off a piece which he thrust
into his pocket. Then seizing the chair again, he made for the
window and threw it with all his force against the panes. They
crashed and the air came rushing in, reviving him enough for the
second attempt. This not only smashed the pane, but loosened the
shutters, and in one instant two sights burst upon his view--the face
of a man in an upper window of the adjoining barn and the sudden
swooping up from below of a column of deadly smoke which seemed to
cut off all hope of his saving himself by the means he had calculated
on. Yet no other way offered. It would be folly to try the door
again. This was the only road, threatening as it looked, to possible
safety for himself and her. He would take it, and if he succumbed in
the effort, it should be with a final thought of her who was fast
becoming an integral part of his own being.
Meanwhile he had mounted to the sill and taken another outward look.
This room, as I have already intimated, was in the rear of an
extension running back from the center of the main building. It
consisted of only two stories, surmounted by a long, slightly-peaked
roof. As the ceilings were low in this portion of the house, the
gutter of this roof was very near the top of the window. To reach it
was not a difficult feat for one of his strength and agility, and if
only the smoke would blow aside--Ah, it is doing so! A sudden change
of wind had come to his rescue, and for the moment the way is clear
for him to work himself out and up on to the ledge above. But once
there, horror makes him weak again. A window, high up in the main
building overlooking the extension, had come in sight, and in it
sways a frantic woman ready to throw herself out. She screamed as he
measured with his eye the height of that window from the sloping roof
and thence to the ground, and he recognized the voice. It was the
same he had heard before, but it was not _hers_. She would not be up
so high, besides the shape and attitude, shown fitfully by the light
of the now leaping flames, were those of a heavier, and less-refined
woman. It was one of the maids--it was _the_ maid Huldah, the one
from whom he had hoped to win some light on this affair. Was she
locked in, too? Her frenzy and mad looking behind and below her
seemed to argue that she was. What deviltry! and, ah! what a
confession of guilt on the part of the vile man who had planned this
abominable end for the two persons whose evidence he dreaded.
Helpless with horror, he became a man again in his indignation. Such
villainy should not succeed. He would fight not only for his own
life, but for this woman's. Miss Demarest was doubtless safe. Yet
he wished he were sure of it; he could work with so much better
heart. Her window was not visible from where he crouched. It was on
the other side of the house. If she screamed, he would not be able
to hear her. He must trust her to Providence. But his dream! his
dream! The power of it was still upon him; a forerunner of fate, a
picture possibly of her doom. The hesitation which this awful
thought caused him warned him that not in this way could he make
himself effective. The woman he saw stood in need of his help, and
to her he must make his way. The bustle which now took place in the
yards beneath, the sudden shouts and the hurried throwing up of
windows all over the house showed that the alarm had now become
general. Another moment, and the appalling cry--the most appalling
which leaves human lips--of fire! fire! rang from end to end of the
threatened building. It was followed by women's shrieks and men's
curses and then--by flames.
"She will hear, she will wake now," he thought, with his whole heart
pulling him her way. But he did not desist from his intention to
drop his eyes from the distraught figure entrapped between a locked
door and a fall of thirty feet. He could reach her if he kept his
nerve. A slow but steady hitch along the gutter was bringing him
nearer every instant. Would she see him and take courage? No! her
eyes were on the flames which were so bright now that he could
actually see them glassed in her eyeballs. Would a shout attract
her? The air was full of cries as the yards filled with escaping
figures, but he would attempt it at the first lull--now--while her
head was turned his way. Did she hear him? Yes. She is looking at
him.
"Don't jump," he cried. "Tie your sheet to the bed-post. Tie it
strong and fasten the other one to it and throw down the end. I will
be here to catch it. Then you must come down hand over hand."
She threw up her arms, staring down at him in mortal terror; then, as
the whole air grew lurid, nodded and tottered back. With incredible
anxiety he watched for her reappearance. His post was becoming
perilous. The fire had not yet reached the roof, but it was rapidly
undermining its supports, and the heat was unendurable. Would he
have to jump to the ground in his own despite? Was it his duty to
wait for this girl, possibly already overcome by her fears and lying
insensible? Yes; so long as he could hold out against the heat, it
was his duty, but--Ah! what was that? Some one was shouting to him.
He had been seen at last, and men, half-clad but eager, were rushing
up the yard with a ladder. He could see their faces. How they
glared in the red light. Help and determination were there, and
perhaps when she saw the promise of this support, it would give nerve
to her fingers and--
But it was not to be. As he watched their eager approach, he saw
them stop, look back, swerve and rush around the corner of the house.
Some one had directed them elsewhere. He could see the pointing
hand, the baleful face. Quimby had realized his own danger in this
prospect of Hammersmith's escape, and had intervened to prevent it.
It was a murderer's natural impulse, and did not surprise him, but it
added another element of danger to his position, and if this woman
delayed much longer--but she is coming; a blanket is thrown out, then
a dangling end of cloth appears above the sill. It descends.
Another moment he has crawled up the roof to the ridge and grasped it.
"Slowly now!" he shouts. "Take time and hold on tight. I will guide
you." He feels the frail support stiffen. She has drawn it into her
hands; now she is on the sill, and is working herself off. He
clutched his end firmly, steadying himself as best he might by
bestriding the ridge of the roof. The strain becomes greater, he
feels her weight, she is slipping down, down. Her hands strike a
knot; the jerk almost throws him off his balance. He utters a word
of caution, lost in the growing roar of the flames whose hungry
tongues have begun to leap above the gutter. She looks down, sees
the approaching peril, and hastens her descent. He is all astrain,
with heart and hand nerved for the awful possibilities of the coming
moments when--ping! Something goes whistling by his ear, which for
the instant sets his hair bristling on his head, and almost paralyzes
every muscle. A bullet! The flame is not threatening enough! Some
one is shooting at him from the dark.
IV
Well! death which comes one way cannot come another, and a bullet is
more merciful than flame. The thought steadies Hammersmith; besides
he has nothing to do with what is taking place behind his back. His
duty is here, to guide and support this rapidly descending figure now
almost with his reach. And he fulfills this duty, though that deadly
"ping" is followed by another, and his starting eyes behold the hole
made by the missile in the clapboard just before him.
She is down. They stand toppling together on the slippery ridge with
no support but the rapidly heating wall down which she had come. He
looks one way, then another. Ten feet either way to the gutter! On
one side leap the flames; beneath the other crouches their secret
enemy. They cannot meet the first and live; needs must they face the
latter. Bullets do not always strike the mark, as witness the two
they had escaped. Besides, there are friends as well as enemies in
the yard on this side. He can hear their encouraging cries. He will
toss down the blanket; perhaps there will be hands to hold it and so
break her fall, if not his.
With a courage which drew strength from her weakness, he carried out
this plan and saw her land in safety amid half a dozen upstretched
arms. Then he prepared to follow her, but felt his courage fail and
his strength ooze without knowing the cause. Had a bullet struck
him? He did not feel it. He was conscious of the heat, but of no
other suffering; yet his limbs lacked life, and it no longer seemed
possible for him to twist himself about so as to fall easily from the
gutter.
"Come on! Come on!" rose in yells from below, but there was no
movement in him.
"We can't wait. The wall will fall," rose affrightedly from below.
But he simply clung and the doom of flame and collapsing timbers was
rushing mercilessly upon him when, in the glare which lit up the
whole dreadful scenery, there rose before his fainting eyes the sight
of Miss Demarest's face turned his way from the crowd below, with all
the terror of a woman's bleeding heart behind it. The joy which this
recognition brought cleared his brain and gave him strength to
struggle with his lethargy. Raising himself on one elbow, he slid
his feet over the gutter, and with a frantic catch at its frail
support, hung for one instant suspended, then dropped softly into the
blanket which a dozen eager hands held out for him.
As he did so, a single gasping cry went up from the hushed throng.
He knew the voice. His rescue had relieved one heart. His own beat
tumultuously and the blood throbbed in his veins as he realized this.
The next thing he remembered was standing far from the collapsing
building, with a dozen men and boys grouped about him. A woman at
his feet was clasping his knees in thankfulness, another sinking in a
faint at the edge of the shadow, but he saw neither, for the blood
was streaming over his eyes from a wound not yet accounted for, and
as he felt the burning flow, he realized a fresh duty.
"Where is Quimby?" he demanded loudly. "He made this hole in my
forehead. He's a murderer and a thief, and I order you all in the
name of the law to assist me in arresting him."
With the confused cry of many voices, the circle widened. Brushing
the blood from his brow, he caught at the nearest man, and with one
glance toward the tottering building, pointed to the wall where he
and the girl Huldah had clung.
"Look!" he shouted, "do you see that black spot? Wait till the smoke
blows aside. There! now! the spot just below the dangling sheet.
It's a bullet-hole. It was made while I crouched there. Quimby held
the gun. He had his reasons for hindering our escape. The girl can
tell you--"
"Yes, yes," rose up from the ground at his feet. "Quimby is a wicked
man. He knew that I knew it and he locked my door when he saw the
flames coming. I'm willing to tell now. I was afraid before."
They stared at her with all the wonder of uncomprehending minds as
she rose with a resolute air to confront them; but as the full
meaning of her words penetrated their benumbed brains, slowly, man by
man, they crept away to peer about in the barns, and among the
clustering shadows for the man who had been thus denounced.
Hammersmith followed them, and for a few minutes nothing but chase
was in any man's mind. That part of the building in which lay hidden
the room of shadows shook, tottered, and fell, loading the heavens
with sparks and lighting up the pursuit now become as wild and
reckless as the scene itself. To Miss Demarest's eyes, just
struggling back to sight and hearing from the nethermost depths of
unconsciousness, it looked like the swirling flight of spirits lost
in the vortex of hell. For one wild moment she thought that she
herself had passed the gates of life and was one of those unhappy
souls whirling over a gulf of flame. The next moment she realized
her mistake. A kindly voice was in her ear, a kindly hand was
pressing a half-burned blanket about her.
"Don't stare so," the voice said. "It is only people routing out
Quimby. They say he set fire to the tavern himself, to hide his
crime and do away with the one man who knew about it. I know that he
locked me in because I--Oh, see! they've got him! they've got him!
and with a gun in his hand!"
The friendly hand fell; both women started upright panting with
terror and excitement. Then one of them drew back, crying in a tone
of sudden anguish, "Why, no! It's Jake, Jake!"
Daybreak! and with it Doctor Golden, who at the first alarm had
ridden out post-haste without waiting to collect his jury. As he
stepped to the ground before the hollow shell and smoking pile which
were all that remained to mark the scene of yesterday's events, he
looked about among the half-clad, shivering men and women peering
from the barns and stables where they had taken refuge, till his eyes
rested on Hammersmith standing like a sentinel before one of the
doors.
"What's this? what's this?" he cried, as the other quickly
approached. "Fire, with a man like you in the house?"
"Fire because I was in the house. They evidently felt obliged to get
rid of me somehow. It's been a night of great experiences for me.
When they found I was not likely to perish in the flames they
resorted to shooting. I believe that my forehead shows where one
bullet passed. Jake's aim might be improved. Not that I am anxious
for it."
"Jake? Do you mean the clerk? Did he fire at you?"
"Yes, while I was on the roof engaged in rescuing one of the women."
"The miserable cur! You arrested him, of course, as soon as you
could lay your hands on him?"
"Yes. He's back of me in this outhouse."
"And Quimby? What about Quimby?"
"He's missing."
"And Mrs. Quimby?"
"Missing, too. They are the only persons unaccounted for."
"Lost in the fire?"
"We don't think so. He was the incendiary and she, undoubtedly, his
accomplice. They would certainly look out for themselves. Doctor
Golden, it was not for insurance money they fired the place; it was
to cover up a crime."
The coroner, more or less prepared for this statement by what
Hammersmith had already told him, showed but little additional
excitement as he dubiously remarked:
"So you still hold to that idea."
Hammersmith glanced about him and, catching more than one curious eye
turned their way from the crowd now rapidly collecting in all
directions, drew the coroner aside and in a few graphic words related
the night's occurrences and the conclusions these had forced upon
him. Doctor Golden listened and seemed impressed at last, especially
by one point.
"You saw Quimby," he repeated; "saw his face distinctly looking
toward your room from one of the stable windows?"
"I can swear to it. I even caught his expression. It was malignant
in the extreme, quite unlike that he usually turns upon his guests."
"Which window was it?"
Hammersmith pointed it out.
"You have been there? Searched the room and the stable?"
"Thoroughly, just as soon as it was light enough to see."
"And found--"
"Nothing; not even a clue."
"The man is lying dead in that heap. She, too, perhaps. We'll have
to put the screws on Jake. A conspiracy like this must be unearthed.
Show me the rascal."
"He's in a most careless mood. _He_ doesn't think his master and
mistress perished in the fire."
"Careless, eh? Well, we'll see. I know that sort."
But when a few minutes later he came to confront the clerk he saw
that his task was not likely to prove quite so easy as his former
experience had led him to expect. Save for a slight nervous
trembling of limb and shoulder--surely not unnatural after such a
night--Jake bore himself with very much the same indifferent ease he
had shown the day before.
Doctor Golden surveyed him with becoming sternness.
"At what time did this fire start?" he asked.
Jake had a harsh voice, but he mellowed it wonderfully as he replied:
"Somewhere about one. I don't carry a watch, go I don't know the
exact time."
"The exact time isn't necessary. Near one answers well enough. How
came you to be completely dressed at near one in a country tavern
like this?"
"I was on watch. There was death in the house."
"Then you were in the house?"
"Yes." His tongue faltered, but not his gaze; that was as direct as
ever. "I was in the house, but not at the moment the fire started.
I had gone to the stable to get a newspaper. My room is in the
stable, the little one high in the cock-loft. I did not find the
paper at once and when I did I stopped to read a few lines. I'm a
slow reader, and by the time I was ready to cross back to the house,
smoke was pouring out of the rear windows, and I stopped short,
horrified! I'm mortally afraid of fire."
"You have shown it. I have not heard that you raised the least
alarm."
"I'm afraid you're right. I lost my head like a fool. You see, I've
never lived anywhere else for the last ten years, and to see my home
on fire was more than I could stand. You wouldn't think me so weak
to look at these muscles."
Baring his arm, he stared down at it with a forlorn shake of his
head. The coroner glanced at Hammersmith. What sort of fellow was
this! A giant with the air of a child, a rascal with the smile of a
humorist. Delicate business, this; or were they both deceived and
the man just a good-humored silly?
Hammersmith answered the appeal by a nod toward an inner door. The
coroner understood and turned back to Jake with the seemingly
irrelevant inquiry:
"Where did you leave Mr. Quimby when you went to the cock-loft?"
"In the house."
"Asleep?"
"No, he was making up his accounts."
"In the office?"
"Yes."
"And that was where you left him?"
"Yes, it was."
"Then, how came he to be looking out of your window just before the
fire broke out?"
"He?" Jake's jaw fell and his enormous shoulders drooped; but only
for a moment. With something between a hitch and a shrug, he drew
himself upright and with some slight display of temper cried out,
"Who says he was there?"
The coroner answered him. "The man behind you. He saw him."
Jake's hand closed in a nervous grip. Had the trigger been against
his finger at that moment it would doubtless have been snapped with
some satisfaction, so the barrel had been pointing at Hammersmith.
"Saw him distinctly," the coroner repeated. "Mr. Quimby's face is
not to be mistaken."
"If he saw him," retorted Jake, with unexpected cunning, "then the
flames had got a start. One don't see in the dark. They hadn't got
much of a start when I left. So he must have gone up to my room
after I came down."
"It was before the alarm was given; before Mr. Hammersmith here had
crawled out of his room window."
"I can't help that, sir. It was after I left the stable. You can't
mix me up with Quimby's doings."
"Can't we? Jake, you're no lawyer and you don't know how to manage a
lie. Make a clean breast of it. It may help you and it won't hurt
Quimby. Begin with the old lady's coming. What turned Quimby
against her? What's the plot?"
"I don't know of any plot. What Quimby told you is true. You
needn't expect me to contradict it!"
A leaden doggedness had taken the place of his whilom good nature.
Nothing is more difficult to contend with. Nothing is more dreaded
by the inquisitor. Hammersmith realized the difficulties of the
situation and repeated the gesture he had previously made toward the
door leading into an adjoining compartment. The coroner nodded as
before and changed the tone of his inquiry.
"Jake," he declared, "you are in a more serious position than you
realize. You may be devoted to Quimby, but there are others who are
not. A night such as you have been through quickens the conscience
of women if it does not that of men. One has been near death. The
story of such a woman is apt to be truthful. Do you want to hear it?
I have no objections to your doing so."
"What story? I don't know of any story. Women have easy tongues;
they talk even when they have nothing to say."
"This woman has something to say, or why should she have asked to be
confronted with you? Have her in, Mr. Hammersmith. I imagine that a
sight of this man will make her voluble."
A sneer from Jake; but when Hammersmith, crossing to the door I've
just mentioned, opened it and let in Huldah, this token of bravado
gave way to a very different expression and he exclaimed half
ironically, half caressingly:
"Why, she's my sweetheart! What can she have to say except that she
was mighty fortunate not to have been burned up in the fire last
night?"
Doctor Golden and the detective crossed looks in some anxiety. They
had not been told of this relation between the two, either by the
girl herself or by the others. Gifted with a mighty close mouth, she
had nevertheless confided to Hammersmith that she could tell things
and would, if he brought her face to face with the man who tried to
shoot him while he was helping her down from the roof. Would her
indignation hold out under the insinuating smile with which the
artful rascal awaited her words? It gave every evidence of doing so,
for her eye flashed threateningly and her whole body showed the
tension of extreme feeling as she came hastily forward, and pausing
just beyond the reach of his arm, cried out:
"You had a hand in locking me in. You're tired of me. If you're
not, why did you fire those bullets my way? I was escaping and--"
Jake thrust in a quick word. "That was Quimby's move--locking your
door. He had some game up. I don't know what it was. I had nothing
to do with it."
This denial seemed to influence her. She looked at him and her
breast heaved. He was good to look at; he must have been more than
that to one of her restricted experience. Hammersmith trembled for
the success of their venture. Would this blond young giant's sturdy
figure and provoking smile prevail against the good sense which must
tell her that he was criminal to the core, and that neither his
principle nor his love were to be depended on? No, not yet. With a
deepening flush, she flashed out:
"You hadn't? You didn't want me dead? Why, then, those bullets?
You might have killed me as well as Mr. Hammersmith when you fired!"
"Huldah!" Astonishment and reproach in the tone and something more
than either in the look which accompanied it. Both were very artful
and betrayed resources not to be expected from one of his ordinarily
careless and good-humored aspect. "You haven't heard what I've said
about that?"
"What could you say?"
"Why, the truth, Huldah. I saw you on the roof. The fire was near.
I thought that neither you nor the man helping you could escape. A
death of that kind is horrible. I loved you too well to see your
suffer. My gun was behind the barn door. I got it and fired out of
mercy."
She gasped. So, in a way, did the two officials. The plea was
specious, and its likely effect upon her so evident.
For answer, he fumbled in his pocket and drew out a small object
which he held up before her between his fat forefinger and thumb. It
was a ring, a thin, plain hoop of gold worth possibly a couple of
dollars, but which in her eyes seemed to posses an incalculable
value, for she had no sooner seen it than her whole face flushed and
a look of positive delight supplanted the passionately aggrieved one
with which she had hitherto faced him.
"You had bought _that_?"
He smiled and returned it to his pocket.
"For you," he simply said.
The joy and pride with which she regarded him, despite the protesting
murmur of the discomfited Hammersmith, proved that the wily Jake had
been too much for them.
"You see!" This to Hammersmith. "Jake didn't mean any harm, only
kindness to us both. If you will let him go, I'll be more thankful
than when you helped me down off the roof. We're wanting to be
married. Didn't you see him show me the ring?"
It was for the coroner to answer.
"We'll let him go when we're assured that he means all that he says.
I haven't as good an opinion of him as you have. I think he's
deceiving you and that you are a very foolish girl to trust him. Men
don't fire on the women they love, for any reason. You'd better tell
me what you have against him."
"I haven't anything against him now."
"But you were going to tell us something--"
"I guess I was fooling."
"People are not apt to fool who have just been in terror of their
lives."
Her eyes sought the ground. "I'm just a hard-working girl," she
muttered almost sullenly. "What should I know about that man
Quimby's dreadful doings?"
"Dreadful? You call them dreadful?" It was Doctor Golden who spoke.
"He locked me in my room," she violently declared. "That wasn't done
for fun."
"And is that all you can tell us? Don't look at Jake. Look at me."
"But I don't know what to say. I don't even know what you want."
"I'll tell you. Your work in the house has been upstairs work,
hasn't it?"
"Yes, sur. I did up rooms--some of them," she added cautiously.
"What rooms? Front rooms, rear rooms, or both?"
"Rooms in front; those on the third floor."
"But you sometimes went into the extension?"
"I've been down the hall."
"Haven't you been in any of the rooms there,--Number 3, for instance?"
"No, sir; my work didn't take me there."
"But you've heard of the room?"
"Yes, sir. The girls sometimes spoke of it. It had a bad name, and
wasn't often used. No girl liked to go there. A man was found dead
in it once. They said he killed his own self."
"Have you ever heard any one describe this room?"
"No, sir."
"Tell what paper was on the wall?"
"No, sir."
"Perhaps Jake here can help us. He's been in the room often."
"The paper was blue; you know that; you saw it yourselves yesterday,"
blurted forth the man thus appealed to.
"Always blue? Never any other color that you remember?"
"No; but I've been in the house only ten years."
"Oh, is that all! And do you mean to say that this room has not been
redecorated in ten years?"
"How can I tell? I can't remember every time a room is repapered."
"You ought to remember this one."
"Why?"
"Because of a very curious circumstance connected with it."
"I don't know of any circumstance."
"You heard what Miss Demarest had to say about a room whose walls
were covered with muddy pink scrolls."
"Oh, she!" His shrug was very expressive. Huldah continued to look
down.
"Miss Demarest seemed to know what she was talking about," pursued
the coroner in direct contradiction of the tone he had taken the day
before. "Her description was quite vivid. It would be strange now
if those walls had once been covered with just such paper as she
described."
An ironic stare, followed by an incredulous smile from Jake; dead
silence and immobility on the part of Huldah.
"Was it?" shot from Doctor Golden's lips with all the vehemence of
conscious authority.
There was an instant's pause, during which Huldah's breast ceased its
regular rise and fall; then the clerk laughed sharply and cried with
the apparent lightness of a happy-go-lucky temperament:
"I should like to know if it was. I'd think it a very curious
quin--quin-- What's the word? quincedence, or something like that."
"The deepest fellow I know," grumbled the baffled coroner into
Hammersmith's ear, as the latter stepped his way, "or just the most
simple." Then added aloud: "Lift up my coat there, please."
Hammersmith did so. The garment mentioned lay across a small table
which formed the sole furnishing of the place, and when Hammersmith
raised it, there appeared lying underneath several small pieces of
plaster which Doctor Golden immediately pointed out to Jake.
"Do you see these bits from a papered wall?" he asked. "They were
torn from that of Number 3, between the breaking out of the fire and
Mr. Hammersmith's escape from the room. Come closer; you may look at
them, but keep your fingers off. You see that the coincidence you
mentioned holds."
Jake laughed again loudly, in a way he probably meant to express
derision; then he stood silent, gazing curiously down at the pieces
before him. The blue paper peeling away from the pink made it
impossible for him to deny that just such paper as Miss Demarest
described had been on the wall prior to the one they had all seen and
remembered.*
* Hammersmith's first attempt to settle this fact must have failed
from his having chosen a spot for his experiment where the old paper
had been stripped away before the new was put on.
"Well, I vum!" Jake finally broke out, turning and looking from one
face to another with a very obvious attempt to carry off the matter
jovially. "She must have a great eye; a--a--(another hard word!
What is it now?) Well! no matter. One of the kind what sees through
the outside of things to what's underneath. I always thought her
queer, but not so queer as that. I'd like to have that sort of power
myself. Wouldn't you, Huldah?"
The girl, whose eye, as Hammersmith was careful to note, had hardly
dwelt for an instant on these bits, not so long by any means as a
woman's natural curiosity would seem to prompt, started as attention
was thus drawn to herself and attempted a sickly smile.
But the coroner had small appreciation for this attempted display of
humor, and motioning to Hammersmith to take her away, he subjected
the clerk to a second examination which, though much more searching
and rigorous than the first, resulted in the single discovery that
for all his specious love-making he cared no more for the girl than
for one of his old hats. This the coroner confided to Hammersmith
when he came in looking disconsolate at his own failure to elicit
anything further from the resolute Huldah.
"But you can't make her believe that now," whispered Hammersmith.
"Then we must trick him into showing her his real feelings."
"How would you set to work? He's warned, she's warned, and life if
not love is at stake."
"It don't look very promising," muttered Doctor Golden, "but--"
He was interrupted by a sudden sound of hubbub without.
"It's Quimby, Quimby!" declared Hammersmith in his sudden excitement.
But again he was mistaken. It was not the landlord, but his wife,
wild-eyed, disheveled, with bits of straw in her hair from some
sheltering hayrick and in her hand a heavy gold chain which, as the
morning sun shone across it, showed sparkles of liquid clearness at
short intervals along its whole length.
Diamonds! Miss Thistlewaite's diamonds, and the woman who held them
was gibbering like an idiot!
The effect on Jake was remarkable. Uttering a piteous cry, he
bounded from their hands and fell at the woman's feet.
"Mother Quimby!" he moaned. "Mother Quimby!" and sought to kiss her
hand and wake some intelligence in her eye.
Meanwhile the coroner and Hammersmith looked on, astonished at these
evidences of real feeling. Then their eyes stole behind them, and
simultaneously both started back for the outhouse they had just left.
Huldah was standing in the doorway, surveying the group before her
with trembling, half-parted lips.
"Jealous!" muttered Hammersmith. "Providence has done our little
trick for us. She will talk now. Look! She's beckoning to us."
V
"Speak quickly. You'll never regret it, Huldah. He's no mate for
you, and you ought to know it. You have seen this paper covered with
the pink scrolls before?"
The coroner had again drawn aside his coat from the bits of plaster.
"Yes," she gasped, with quick glances at her lover through the open
doorway. "He never shed tears for me!" she exclaimed bitterly. "I
didn't know he could for anybody. Oh, I'll tell what I've kept quiet
here," and she struck her breast violently. "I wouldn't keep the
truth back now if the minister was waiting to marry us. He loves
that old woman and he doesn't love me. Hear him call her 'mother.'
Are mothers dearer than sweethearts? Oh, I'll tell! I don't know
anything about the old lady, but I do know that room 3 was repapered
the night before last, and secretly, by him. I didn't see him do it,
nobody did, but this is how I know: Some weeks ago I was hunting for
something in the attic, when I stumbled upon some rolls of old wall
paper lying in a little cubby-hole under the eaves. The end of one
of the rolls was torn and lay across the floor. I couldn't help
seeing it or remembering its color. It was like this, blue and
striped. Exactly like it," she repeated, "just as shabby and
old-looking. The rain had poured in on it, and it was all moldy and
stained. It smelt musty. I didn't give two thoughts to it then, but
when after the old lady's death I heard one of the girls say
something in the kitchen about a room being blue now which only a
little while ago was pink, I stole up into the attic to see if those
rolls were still there and found them every one gone. Oh, what is
happening now?"
"One of the men is trying to take the diamonds from the woman and she
won't let him. Her wits are evidently gone--frightened away by the
horrors of the night--or she wouldn't try to cling to what has
branded her at once as a thief."
The word seemed to pierce the girl. She stared out at her former
mistress, who was again being soothed by the clerk, and murmured
hoarsely:
"A thief! and he don't seem to mind, but is just as good to her! Oh,
oh, I once served a term myself for--for a smaller thing than that
and I thought that was why-- Oh, sir, oh, sir, there's no mistake
about the paper. For I went looking about in the barrels and where
they throw the refuse, for bits to prove that this papering had been
done in the night. It seemed so wonderful to me that any one, even
Jake, who is the smartest man you ever saw, could do such a job as
that and no one know. And though I found nothing in the barrels, I
did in the laundry stove. It was full of burned paper, and some of
it showed color, and it was just that musty old blue I had seen in
the attic."
She paused with a terrified gasp; Jake was looking at her from the
open door.
"Oh, Jake!" she wailed out, "why weren't you true to me? Why did you
pretend to love me when you didn't?"
He gave her a look, then turned on his heel. He was very much
subdued in aspect and did not think to brush away the tear still
glistening on his cheek.
"I've said my last word to you," he quietly declared, then stood
silent a moment, with slowly laboring chest and an air of deepest
gloom. But, as his eye stole outside again, they saw the spirit melt
within him and simple human grief take the place of icy resolution.
"She was like a mother to me," he murmured. "And now they say she'll
never be herself again as long as she lives." Suddenly his head rose
and he faced the coroner.
"You're right," said he. "It's all up with me. No home, no
sweetheart, no missus. _She_ [there was no doubt as to whom he meant
by that tremulous _she_] was the only one I've ever cared for and
she's just shown herself a thief. I'm no better. This is our story."
I will not give it in his words, but in my own. It will be shorter
and possibly more intelligible.
The gang, if you may call it so, consisted of Quimby and these two,
with a servant or so in addition. Robbery was its aim; a discreet
and none too frequent spoliation of such of their patrons as lent
themselves to their schemes. Quimby was the head, his wife the soul
of this business, and Jake their devoted tool. The undermining of
the latter's character had been begun early; a very dangerous
undermining, because it had for one of its elements good-humor and
affectionate suggestion. At fourteen he was ready for any crime, but
he was mercifully kept out of the worst till he was a full-grown man.
Then he did his part. The affair of the old woman was an
unpremeditated one. It happened in this wise: Miss Demarest's story
had been true in every particular. Her mother was with her when she
came to the house, and he, Jake, was the person sitting far back in
the shadows at the time the young lady registered. There was nothing
peculiar in the occurrence or in their behavior except the decided
demand which Miss Demarest made for separate rooms. This attracted
his attention, for the house was pretty full and only one room was
available in the portion reserved for transients. What would Quimby
do? He couldn't send two women away, and he was entirely too
conciliatory and smooth to refuse a request made so peremptorily.
Quimby did nothing. He hemmed, hawed, and looked about for his wife.
She was in the inner office back of him, and, attracted by his uneasy
movements, showed herself. A whispered consultation followed, during
which she cast a glance Jake's way. He understood her instantly and
lounged carelessly forward. "Let them have Number 3," he said.
"It's all fixed for the night. I can sleep anywhere, on the settle
here or even on the floor of the inner office."
He had whispered these words, for the offer meant more than appeared.
Number 3 was never given to guests. It was little more than a closet
and was not even furnished. A cot had been put in that very
afternoon, but only to meet a special emergency. A long-impending
conference was going to be held between him and his employers
subsequent to closing up time, and he had planned this impromptu
refuge to save himself a late walk to the stable. At his offer to
pass the same over to the Demarests, the difficulty of the moment
vanished. Miss Demarest was shown to the one empty room in front,
and the mother--as being the one less likely to be governed by
superstitious fears if it so happened that some rumor of the
undesirability of the haunted Number 3 should have reached them--to
the small closet so hastily prepared for the clerk. Mrs. Quimby
accompanied her, and afterward visited her again for the purpose of
carrying her a bowl and some water. It was then she encountered Miss
Demarest, who, anxious for a second and more affectionate good-night
from her mother, had been wandering the halls in a search for her
room. There was nothing to note in this simple occurrence, and Mrs.
Quimby might have forgotten all about it if Miss Demarest had not
made a certain remark on leaving the room. The bareness and
inhospitable aspect of the place may have struck her, for she stopped
in the doorway and, looking back, exclaimed: "What ugly paper!
Magenta, too, the one color my mother hates." This Mrs. Quimby
remembered, for she also hated magenta, and never went into this room
if she could help it.
The business which kept them all up that night was one totally
disconnected with the Demarests or any one else in the house. A
large outstanding obligation was coming due which Quimby lacked the
money to meet. Something must be done with the stolen notes and
jewelry which they had accumulated in times past and had never found
the will or courage to dispose of. A choice must be made of what was
salable. But what choice? It was a question that opened the door to
endless controversy and possibly to a great difference of opinion;
for in his way Quimby was a miser of the worst type and cared less
for what money would do than for the sight and feeling of the money
itself, while Mrs. Quimby was even more tenacious in her passion for
the trinkets and gems which she looked upon as her part of the booty.
Jake, on the contrary, cared little for anything but the good of the
couple to whom he had attached himself. He wished Quimby to be
satisfied, but not at Mrs. Quimby's expense. He was really fond of
the woman and he was resolved that she should have no cause to
grieve, even if he had to break with the old man. Little did any of
them foresee what the night really held for them, or on what a jagged
and unsuspected rock their frail bark was about to split.
Shutting-up time came, and with it the usual midnight quiet. All the
doors had been locked and the curtains drawn over the windows and
across the glass doors of the office. They were determined to do
what they had never done before, lay out the loot and make a
division. Quimby was resolved to see the diamonds which his wife had
kept hidden for so long, and she, the securities, concerning the
value of which he had contradicted himself so often. Jake's presence
would keep the peace; they had no reason to fear any undue urging of
his claims. All this he knew, and he was not therefore surprised,
only greatly excited, when, after a last quiet look and some
listening at the foot of the stairs, Mr. Quimby beckoned him into the
office and, telling him to lock the door behind him, stepped around
the bar to summon his wife. Jake never knew how it happened. He
flung the door to and locked it, as he thought, but he must have
turned the key too quickly, for the bolt of the lock did not enter
the jamb, as they afterward found. Meanwhile they felt perfectly
secure. The jewels were brought out of Mrs. Quimby's bedroom and
laid on the desk. The securities were soon laid beside them. They
had been concealed behind a movable brick at the side of the
fireplace. Then the discussion began, involving more or less heat
and excitement.
How long this lasted no one ever knew. At half-past eleven no change
of attitude had taken place either in Quimby or his wife. At twelve
the only difference marked by Jake was the removal of the securities
to Quimby's breast pocket, and of the diamond-studded chain to Mrs.
Quimby's neck. The former were too large for the pocket, the latter
too brilliant for the dark calico background they blazed against.
Jake, who was no fool, noted both facts, but had no words for the
situation. He was absorbed, and he saw that Quimby was absorbed, in
watching her broad hand creeping over those diamonds and huddling
them up in a burning heap against her heart. There was fear in the
action, fierce and overmastering fear, and so there was in her eyes
which, fixed and glassy, stared over their shoulders at the wall
behind, as though something had reached out from that wall and struck
at the very root of her being. What did it mean? There was nothing
in the room to affright her. Had she gone daft? Or--
Suddenly they both felt the blood congeal in their own veins; each
turned to each a horrified face, then slowly and as if drawn by a
power supernatural and quite outside of their own will, their two
heads turned in the direction she was looking, and they beheld
standing in their midst a sceptre--no, it was the figure of a living,
breathing woman, with eyes fastened on those jewels,--those
well-known, much-advertised jewels! So much they saw in that instant
flash, then nothing! For Quimby, in a frenzy of unreasoning fear,
had taken the chair from under him and had swung it at the figure. A
lamp had stood on the bar top. It was caught by the backward swing
of the chair, overturned and quenched. The splintering of glass
mingled: its small sound with an ominous thud in the thick darkness.
It was the end of all things; the falling of an impenetrable curtain
over a horror half sensed, yet all the greater for its mystery.
The silence--the terror--the unspeakable sense of doom which gripped
them all was not broken by a heart-beat. All listened for a stir, a
movement where they could see nothing. But the stillness remained
unbroken. The silence was absolute. The figure which they had
believed themselves to have seen had been a dream, an imagination of
their over-wrought minds. It could not be otherwise. The door had
been locked, entrance was impossible; yet doubt held them powerless.
The moments were making years of themselves. To each came in a flash
a review of every earthly incident they had experienced, every wicked
deed, every unholy aspiration. Quimby gritted his teeth. It was the
first sound which had followed that thud and, slight as it was, it
released them somewhat from their awful tension. Jake felt that he
could move now, and was about to let forth his imprisoned breath when
he felt the touch of icy fingers trailing over his cheek, and started
back with a curse. It was Mrs. Quimby feeling about for him in the
impenetrable darkness, and in another moment he could hear her
smothered whisper:
"Are you there, Jake?"
"Yes; where are you?"
"Here," said the woman, with, an effort to keep her teeth from
striking together.
"For God's sake, a light!" came from the hollow darkness beyond.
It was Quimby's voice at last. Jake answered:
"No light for me. I'll stay where I am till daybreak."
"Get a light, you fool!" commanded Quimby, but not without a tremble
in his usually mild tone.
Hard breathing from Jake, but no other response. Quimby seemed to
take a step nearer, for his voice was almost at their ears now.
"Jake, you can have anything I've got so as you get a light now."
"There ain't nothing to light here. You broke the lamp."
Quiet for a moment, then Quimby muttered hoarsely:
"If you ain't scared out of your seven senses, you can go down cellar
and bring up that bit of candle 'longside the ale-barrels."
Into the cellar! Not Jake. The moving of the rickety table which
his fat hand had found and rested on spoke for him.
Another curse from Quimby. Then the woman, though with some
hesitation, said with more self-control than could be expected:
"I'll get it," and they heard her move away from it toward the
trap-door behind the bar.
The two men made no objection. To her that cold, black cellar might
seem a refuge from the unseen horror centered here. It had not
struck them so. It had its own possibilities, and Jake wondered at
her courage, as he caught the sound of her groping advance and the
sudden clatter and clink of bottles as the door came up and struck
the edge of the bar. There was life and a suggestion of home in that
clatter and clink, and all breathed easier for a moment, but only for
a moment. The something lying there behind them, or was it almost
under their feet, soon got its hold again upon their fears, and Jake
found himself standing stock-still, listening both ways for that
dreaded, or would it be welcome, movement on the floor behind, and to
the dragging sound of Mrs. Quimby's skirt and petticoat as she made
her first step down those cellar-stairs. What an endless time it
took! He could rush down there in a minute, but she--she could not
have reached the third step yet, for that always creaked. Now it did
creak. Then there was no sound for some time, unless it was the
panting of Quimby's breath somewhere over by the bar. Then the stair
creaked again. She must be nearly up.
"Here's matches and the candle," came in a hollow voice from the
trap-stairs.
A faint streak appeared for an instant against the dark, then
disappeared. Another; but no lasting light. The matches were too
damp to burn.
"Jake, ain't you got a match?" appealed the voice of Quimby in
half-choked accents.
After a bit of fumbling a small blaze shot up from where Jake stood.
Its sulphurous smell may have suggested to all, as it did to one, the
immeasurable distance of heaven at that moment, and the awful
nearness of hell. They could see now, but not one of them looked in
the direction where all their thoughts lay. Instead of that, they
rolled their eyes on each other, while the match burned slowly out;
Mrs. Quimby from the trap, her husband from the bar, and Jake.
Suddenly he found words, and his cry rang through the room:
"The candle! the candle! this is my only match. Where is the candle?"
Quimby leaped forward and with shaking hand held the worn bit of
candle to the flame. It failed to ignite. The horrible, dreaded
darkness was about to close upon them again before--before-- But
another hand had seized the candle. Mrs. Quimby has come forward,
and as the match sends up its last flicker, thrusts the wick against
the flame and the candle flares up. It is lighted.
Over it they give each other one final appealing stare. There's no
help for it now; they must look. Jake's head turned first, then Mrs.
Quimby, and then that of the real aggressor.
A simultaneous gasp from them all betrays the worst. It had been no
phantom called into being by their overtaxed nerves. A woman lay
before them, face downward on the hard floor. A woman dressed in
black, with hat on head and a little satchel clutched in one stiff,
outstretched hand. Miss Demarest's mother! The little old lady who
had come into the place four hours before!
With a muttered execration, Jake stepped over to her side and
endeavored to raise her; but he instantly desisted, and looking up at
Quimby and his wife, moved his lips with the one fatal word which
ends all hope:
"Dead!"
They listened appalled. "Dead?" echoed the now terrified Quimby.
"Dead?" repeated his no less agitated wife.
Jake was the least overcome of the three. With another glance at the
motionless figure, he rose, and walking around the body, crossed to
the door and seeing what he had done to make entrance possible,
cursed himself and locked it properly. Meanwhile, Mrs. Quimby, with
her eyes on her husband, had backed slowly away till she had reached
the desk, against which she now stood with fierce and furious eyes,
still clutching at her chain.
Quimby watched her fascinated. He had never seen her look like this
before. What did it portend? They were soon to know.
"Coward!" fell from her lips, as she stared with unrelenting hate at
her husband. "An old woman who was not even conscious of what she
saw! I'll not stand for this killing, Jacob. You may count me out
of this and the chain, too. If you don't--" a threatening gesture
finished the sentence and the two men looking at her knew that they
had come up against a wall.
"Susan!" Was that Quimby speaking? "Susan, are you going back on me
now?"
She pointed at the motionless figure lying in its shrouding black
like an ineffaceable blot on the office floor, then at the securities
showing above the edge of his pocket.
"Were we not close enough to discovery, without drawing the attention
of the police by such an unnecessary murder? She was walking in her
sleep. I remember her eyes as she advanced toward me; there was no
sight in them."
"You lie!" It was the only word which Quimby found to ease the shock
which this simple statement caused him. But Jake saw from the nature
of the glance he shot at his poor old victim that her words had
struck home. His wife saw it, too, but it did not disturb the set
line of her determined mouth.
"You'll let me keep the chain," she said, "and you'll use your wits,
now that you have used your hand, to save yourself and myself from
the charge of murder."
Quimby, who was a man of great intelligence when his faculties were
undisturbed by anger or shock, knelt and turned his victim carefully
over so that her face was uppermost.
"It was not murder," he uttered in an indescribable tone after a few
minutes of cautious scrutiny. "The old lady fell and struck her
forehead. See! the bruise is scarcely perceptible. Had she been
younger--"
"A sudden death from any cause in this house at just this time is
full of danger for us," coldly broke in his wife.
The landlord rose to his feet, walked away to the window, dropped his
head, thought for a minute, and then slowly came back, glanced at the
woman again, at her dress, her gloved hands, and her little satchel.
"She didn't die in this house," fell from his lips in his most oily
accents. "She fell in the woods; the path is full of bared roots,
and there she must be found to-morrow morning. Jake, are you up to
the little game?"
Jake, who was drawing his first full breath, answered with a calm
enough nod, whereupon Quimby bade his wife to take a look outside and
see if the way was clear for them to carry the body out.
She did not move. He fell into a rage; an unusual thing for him.
"Bestir yourself! do as I bid you," he muttered.
Her eyes held his; her face took on the look he had learned to dread.
Finally she spoke:
"And the daughter! What about the daughter?"
Quimby stood silent; then with a sidelong leer, and in a tone smooth
as oil, but freighted with purpose, "The mother first; we'll look
after the daughter later."
Mrs. Quimby shivered; then as her hand spread itself over the
precious chain sparkling with the sinister gleam of serpent's eyes on
her broad bosom, she grimly muttered:
"How? I'm for no more risks, I tell you."
Jake took a step forward. He thought his master was about to rush
upon her. But he was only gathering up his faculties to meet the new
problem she had flung at him.
"The girl's a mere child; we shall have no difficulty with her," he
muttered broodingly. "Who saw these two come in?"
Then it came out that no one but themselves had been present at their
arrival. Further consultation developed that the use to which Number
3 had been put was known to but one of the maids, who could easily be
silenced. Whereupon Quimby told his scheme. Mrs. Quimby was
satisfied, and he and Jake prepared to carry it out.
The sensations of the next half-hour, as told by Jake, would make
your flesh creep. They did not dare to carry a lamp to light the
gruesome task, and well as they knew the way, the possibilities of a
stumble or a fall against some one of the many trees they had to pass
filled them with constant terror. They did stumble once, and the low
cry Jake uttered caused them new fears. Was that a window they heard
flying up? No; but something moved in the bushes. They were sure of
this and guiltily shook in their shoes; but nothing advanced out of
the shadows, and they went on.
But the worst was when they had to turn their backs upon the body
left lying face downward in the cold, damp woods. Men of no
compassion, unreached by ordinary sympathies, they felt the furtive
skulking back, step by step, along ways commonplace enough in the
daytime, but begirt with terrors now and full of demoniac suggestion.
The sight of a single thread of light marking the door left ajar for
them by Mrs. Quimby was a beacon of hope which was not even disturbed
by the sight of her wild figure walking in a circle round and round
the office, the stump of candle dripping unheeded over her fingers,
and her eyes almost as sightless as those of the form left in the
woods.
"Susan!" exclaimed her husband, laying hand on her.
She paused at once. The presence of the two men had restored her
self-possession.
But all was not well yet. Jake drew Quimby's attention to the
register where the two names of mother and daughter could be seen in
plain black and white.
"Oh, that's nothing!" exclaimed the landlord, and, taking out his
knife, he ripped the leaf out, together with the corresponding one in
the back. "The devil's on our side all right, or why did she pass
over the space at the bottom of the page and write their two names at
the top of the next one?"
He started, for his wife had clutched his arm.
"Yes, the devil's on our side thus far," said she, "but here he
stops. I have just remembered something that will upset our whole
plan and possibly hang us. Miss Demarest visited her mother in
Number 3 and noticed the room well, and particularly the paper. Now
if she is able to describe that paper, it might not be so easy for us
to have our story believed."
For a minute all stood aghast, then Jake quietly remarked: "It is now
one by the clock. If you can find me some of that old blue paper I
once chucked under the eaves in the front attic, I will engage to
have it on those four walls before daylight. Bring the raggedest
rolls you can find. If it shouldn't be dry to the touch when they
come to see it to-morrow, it must look so stained and old that no one
will think of laying hand on it. I'll go make the paste."
As Jake was one of the quickest and most precise of workers at
anything he understood, this astonishing offer struck the other two
as quite feasible. The paper was procured, the furniture moved back,
and a transformation made in the room in question which astonished
even those concerned in it. Dawn rose upon the completed work and,
the self-possession of all three having been restored with the
burning up of such scraps as remained after the four walls were
covered, they each went to their several beds for a half-hour of
possible rest. Jake's was in Number 3. He has never said what that
half-hour was to him!
The rest we know. The scheme did not fully succeed, owing to the
interest awakened in one man's mind by the beauty and seeming truth
of Miss Demarest. Investigation followed which roused the landlord
to the danger threatening them from the curiosity of Hammersmith, and
it being neck or nothing with him, he planned the deeper crime of
burning up room and occupant before further discoveries could be
made. What became of him in the turmoil which followed, no one could
tell, not even Jake. They had been together in Jake's room before
the latter ran out with his gun, but beyond that the clerk knew
nothing. Of Mrs. Quimby he could tell more. She had not been taken
into their confidence regarding the fire, some small grains of
humanity remaining in her which they feared might upset their scheme.
She had only been given some pretext for locking Huldah in her room,
and it was undoubtedly her horror at her own deed when she saw to
what it had committed her which unsettled her brain and made her a
gibbering idiot for life.
Or was it some secret knowledge of her husband's fate, unknown to
others. We cannot tell, for no sign nor word of Jacob Quimby ever
came to dispel the mystery of his disappearance.
And this is the story of Three Forks Tavern and the room numbered 3.
The Gray Lady
BY ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
Was it a spectre?
For days I could not answer this question. I am no believer in
spiritual manifestations, yet-- But let me tell my story.
I was lodging with my wife on the first floor of a house in
Twenty-seventh Street. I had taken the apartments for three months,
and we had already lived in them two and found them sufficiently
comfortable. The back room we used as a bedroom, and as we received
but few friends, the two great leaves of old mahogany connecting the
rooms, usually stood wide open.
One morning, my wife being ill, I left her lying in bed and stepped
into the parlor preparatory to going out for breakfast. It was
late--nine o'clock probably--and I was hastening to leave, when I
heard a sound behind me--or did I merely feel a presence?--and,
turning, saw a strange and totally unknown woman coming toward me
from my wife's room.
As I had just left that room, and as there was no other way of
entrance save through a door we always kept locked, I was so
overpowered by my astonishment that I never thought of speaking or
moving until she had passed me. Then I found voice, and calling out
"Madam!" endeavored to stop her.
But the madam, if madam she was, passed on as quietly, as
mechanically even, as if I had not raised my voice, and before I
could grasp the fact that she was melting from before me flitted
through the hall to the front door and so out, leaving behind on the
palm of my hand the "feel" of her wool dress, which I had just
managed to touch.
Not understanding her or myself or the strange thrill awakened by
this contact, I tore open the front door and looked out, expecting,
of course, to see her on the steps or on the sidewalk in front. But
there was no one of her appearance visible, and I came back
questioning whether I was the victim of a hallucination or just an
everyday fool. To satisfy myself on this important question I looked
about for the hallboy, with the intention of asking him if he had
seen any such person go out, but that young and inconsequent scamp
was missing from his post as usual and there was no one within sight
to appeal to.
There was nothing to do but to re-enter my rooms, where my attention
was immediately arrested by the sight of my wife sitting up in bed
and surveying me with a look of unmistakable astonishment.
"Who was that woman?" she asked. "And how came she in here?"
So she had seen her too.
"What woman, Lydia? I have not let in any woman. Did you think
there was a woman in this room?"
"Not in that room," she answered hoarsely, "but in this one. I saw
her just now passing through the folding doors. Wilbur, I am
frightened. See how my hands shake. Do you think I am sick enough
to imagine things?"
I knew she was not, but I did not say so. I thought it would be
better for her to think herself under some such delusion.
"You were dozing," said I. "If you had seen a woman here you could
tell me how she looked."
"And I can," my wife broke in excitedly. "She was like the ghosts we
read of, only that her dress and the veil or drapery she wore were
all gray. Didn't you see her? You must have seen her. She went
right by you--a gray woman, all gray; a lady, Wilbur, and slightly
lame. Could I have dreamed all that?"
"You must have!" I protested, shaking the door leading directly into
the hall so she might see it was locked, and even showing her the key
to it lying in its accustomed place behind the bureau cushion. Yet I
was in no satisfied condition myself, for she had described with the
greatest accuracy the very person I had myself seen. Had we been
alike the victims of a spiritual manifestation?
This was Tuesday. On Friday my question seemed to receive an answer.
I had been downtown, as usual, and on returning found a crowd
assembled in front of my lodging-house. A woman had been run over
and was being carried into our rooms. In the glimpse I caught of her
I saw that she was middle-aged and was wrapped in a long black cloak.
Later this cloak fell off, as her hat had done long before, and I
perceived that her dress was black and decent.
She was laid on our bed and every attention paid her. But she had
been grievously injured about the head and gradually but surely sank
before our eyes. Suddenly she roused and gave a look about her. It
was a remarkable one--a look of recognition and almost of delight.
Then she raised one hand and, pointing with a significant gesture
into the empty space before her, sank back and died.
It was a sudden ending, and, anxious to see its effect upon my wife,
who was standing on the other side of the bed, I glanced her way with
some misgiving. She showed more feeling than I had anticipated.
Indeed her countenance was a study, and when, under the influence of
my scrutiny, she glanced my way, I saw that something of deeper
import than this unexpected death in our rooms lay at the bottom of
her uneasy look.
What that was I was soon to know, for catching up from amid the folds
of the woman's gray-lined cloak a long gray veil which had fallen at
the bedside, she disposed it softly about the woman's face, darting
me a look full of significance.
"You remember the vision I had the morning when I was sick?" she
whispered softly in my ear.
I nodded, secretly thrilled to my very heart's core.
"Well, it was a vision of this woman. If she were living and on her
feet and wrapped, as I have shown you, in this veil, you would behold
a living picture of the person I saw passing out of this room that
morning."
"I shall not dispute you," I answered. Alas! I had myself perceived
the likeness the instant the veil had fallen about the pinched but
handsome features!
"A forewarning," whispered my wife; "a forewarning of what has this
day happened under our roof. It was a wraith we saw. Wilbur, I
shall not spend another night in these rooms."
And we did not. I was as anxious to leave as she was. Yet I am not
a superstitious man. As proof of it, after the first effect of these
events had left me I began to question my first impressions and feel
tolerably ashamed of my past credulity. Though the phenomenon we had
observed could not to all appearance be explained by any natural
hypothesis; though I had seen, and my wife had seen, a strange woman
suddenly become visible in a room which a moment before had held no
one but ourselves, and into which no live woman could have entered
without our knowledge, something--was it my natural good
sense?--recoiled before a supernatural explanation of this, and I
found myself forced to believe that our first visitor had been as
real as the last; in other words, the same woman.
But could I prove it? Could the seemingly impossible be made
possible and the unexplainable receive a solution satisfying to a
rational mind? I determined to make an effort to accomplish this, if
only to relieve the mind of my wife, who had not recovered her
equanimity as readily as myself.
Starting with the assumption above mentioned--that the woman who had
died in our presence was the same who had previously found an
unexplainable entrance into our rooms--I first inquired if the black
cloak lined with gray did not offer a solution to some of my previous
difficulties. It was a long cloak, enveloping her completely. When
worn with the black side out she would present an inconspicuous
appearance, but with the gray side out and the effect of this
heightened by a long gray veil hung over her hat, she would look like
the gray lady I had first seen. Now, a cloak can be turned in an
instant, and if she had chosen to do this in flitting through my door
I would naturally find only a sedate, black-clothed woman passing up
the street, when, rousing from the apathy into which her appearance
had thrown me, I rushed to the front door and looked out. Had I seen
such a woman? I seemed to remember that I had.
Thus much, then, was satisfactory, but to account for her entrance
into our rooms was not so easy. Had she slipped by me in coming in
as she had on going out? The parlor door was open, for I had been
out to get the paper. Could she have glided in by me unperceived and
thus found her way into the bedroom from which I afterward saw her
issue? No, for I had stood facing the front hall door all the time.
Through the bedroom door, then? But that was, as I have said,
locked. Here, then, was a mystery; but it was one worth solving.
My first step was to recall all that I had heard of the actual woman
who had been buried from our rooms. Her name, as ascertained in the
cheap boarding-house to which she was traced, was Helmuth, and she
was, so far as any one knew, without friends or relatives in the
city. To those who saw her daily she was a harmless, slightly
demented woman with money enough to live above want, but not enough
to warrant her boasting talk about the rich things she was going to
buy some day and the beautiful presents she would soon be in a
position to give away. The money found on her person was sufficient
to bury her, but no papers were in her possession nor any letters
calculated to throw light upon her past life.
Her lameness had been caused by paralysis, but the date of her attack
was not known.
Finding no clue in this to what I wished to learn, I went back to our
old rooms, which had not been let since our departure, and sought for
one there, and, strangely enough, found it. I thought I knew
everything there was to be known about the apartment we had lived in
two months, but one little fact had escaped me which, under the
scrutiny that I now gave it, became apparent. This was simply that
the key which opened the hall door of the bedroom and which we had
seldom if ever used was not as old a key as that of the corresponding
door in the parlor, and this fact, small as it was, led me to make
inquiries.
The result was that I learned something about the couple who had
preceded us in the use of these rooms. They were of middle age and
of great personal elegance but uncertain pay, the husband being
nothing more nor less than a professional gambler. Their name was
L'Hommedieu.
When I first heard of them I thought that Mrs. L'Hommedieu might be
the Mrs. Helmuth in whose history I was so interested, but from all I
could learn she was a very different sort of person. Mrs.
L'Hommedieu was gay, dashing, and capable of making a show out of
flimsy silk a shopgirl would hesitate to wear. Yet she looked
distinguished and wore her cheap jewelry with more grace than many a
woman her diamonds. I would, consequently, have dropped this inquiry
if some one had not remarked upon her having had a paralytic stroke
after leaving the house. This, together with the fact that the key
to the rear door, which I had found replaced by a new one, had been
taken away by her and never returned, connected her so indubitably
with my mysterious visitor that I resolved to pursue my
investigations into Mrs. L'Hommedieu's past.
For this purpose I sought out a quaint little maiden lady living on
the top floor who, I was told, knew more about the L'Hommedieus than
any one in the building. Miss Winterburn, whose acquaintance I had
failed to make while residing in the house, was a fluttering, eager,
affable person whose one delight was, as I soon found, to talk about
the L'Hommedieus. Of the story she related I give as much of it as
possible in her own words.
"I was never their equal," said she, "but Mrs. L'Hommedieu was
lonely, and, having no friends in town, was good enough to admit me
to her parlor now and then and even to allow me to accompany her to
the theater when her husband was away on one of his mysterious
visits. I never liked Mr. L'Hommedieu, but I did like her. She was
so different from me, and, when I first knew her, so gay and so full
of conversation. But after a while she changed and was either
feverishly cheerful or morbidly sad, so that my visits caused me more
pain than pleasure. The reason for these changes in her was patent
to everybody. Though her husband was a handsome man, he was as
unprincipled as he was unfortunate. He gambled. This she once
admitted to me, and while at long intervals he met with some luck he
more often returned dispirited and with that hungry, ravaging look
you expect to see in a wolf cheated of its prey.
"I used to be afraid he would strike her after some one of these
disappointments, but I do not think he ever did. She had a
determined character of her own, and there have been times when I
have thought he was as much afraid of her as she was of him. I
became sure of this after one night. Mrs. L'Hommedieu and myself
were having a little supper together in the front parlor you have so
lately occupied. It was a very ordinary supper, for the
L'Hommedieus' purse had run low, and Mrs. L'Hommedieu was not the
woman to spend much at any time on her eating. It was palatable,
however, and I would have enjoyed it greatly if Mrs. L'Hommedieu had
shown more appetite. But she ate scarcely anything and seemed very
anxious and unhappy, though she laughed now and then with sudden
gusts of mirth too hysterical to be real. It was not late, and yet
we were both very much surprised when there came a knock at the door,
followed by the entrance of a visitor.
"Mrs. L'Hommedieu, who was always _la grande dame_, rose without
apparent embarrassment to meet the gentleman who entered, though I
knew she could not help but feel keenly the niggardly appearance of
the board she left with such grace. The stranger--he was certainly a
stranger; this I could see by the formality of her manner--was a
gentleman of urbane bearing and a general air of prosperity.
"I remember every word that passed.
"'My name is Lafarge,' said he. 'I am, or rather have been, under
great obligations to your husband, and I have come to discharge my
debt. Is he at home?'
"Mrs. L'Hommedieu's eye, which had sparkled at his name, dropped
suddenly as he put the final question.
"'I am sorry,' she returned after a moment of embarrassment, 'but my
husband is very seldom home evenings. If you will come about noon
some day--'
"'Thank you,' said he, with a bright smile, 'but I will finish my
business now and with you, seeing that Mr. L'Hommedieu is not at
home. Years ago--I am sure you have heard your husband mention my
name--I borrowed quite a sum of money from him, which I have never
paid. You recall the amount, no doubt?'
"'I have heard Mr. L'Hommedieu say it was a thousand dollars,' she
replied, with a sudden fluttering of her hands indicative of great
excitement.
"'That is the sum,' he allowed, either not noticing me or thinking me
too insignificant to be considered. 'I regret to have kept him so
long out of it, but I have not forgotten to add the interest in
making out this statement of my indebtedness, and if you will look
over this paper and acknowledge its correctness I will leave the
equivalent of my debt here and now, for I sail for Europe to-morrow
morning and wish to have all my affairs in order before leaving.'
"Mrs. L'Hommedieu, who looked ready to faint from excess of feeling,
summoned up her whole strength, looking so beautiful as she did so
that one forgot the ribbons on her sleeves were no longer fresh and
that the silk dress she wore hung in the very limpest of folds.
"'I am obliged to you,' she said in a tone from which she strove in
vain to suppress all eagerness. 'And if I can speak for Mr.
L'Hommedieu he will be as grateful for your remembrance of us as for
the money you so kindly offer to return to him.'
"'The stranger bowed low and took out a folded paper, which he handed
to her. He was not deceived, I am sure, by her grand airs, and knew
as well as I did that no woman ever stood in greater need of money.
But nothing in his manner betrayed this knowledge.
"'It is a bond I give you,' he now explained. 'As you will see, it
has coupons attached to it which you can cash at any time. It will
prove as valuable to you as so much ready money and possibly more
convenient.'
"And with just this hint, which I took as significant of his complete
understanding of her position, he took her receipt and politely left
the house.
"Once alone with me, who am nobody, her joy had full vent. I have
never seen any one so lost in delight as she was for a few minutes.
To have this money thrust upon her just at a moment when actual want
seemed staring her in the face was too much of a relief for her to
conceal either the misery she had been under or the satisfaction she
now enjoyed. Under the gush of her emotions her whole history came
out, but as you have often heard the like I will not repeat it,
especially as it was all contained in the cry with which a little
later she thrust the bond into my hand.
"'He must not see it! He must not! It would go like all the rest,
and I should again be left without a cent. Take it and keep it, for
I have no means of concealing it here. He is too suspicious.'
"But this was asking more than I was willing to grant. Seeing how I
felt, she took the paper back and concealed it in her bosom with a
look I had rather not have seen. 'You will not charge yourself with
such a responsibility,' said she. 'But I can trust you not to tell
him?'
"'Yes,' I nodded, feeling sick of the whole business.
"'Then--But here the door was violently flung open and Mr.
L'Hommedieu burst into the room in a state of as much excitement as
his wife, only his was the excitement of desperation.
"Gone! Gone!' he cried, ignoring me as completely as Mr. Lafarge had
done. 'Not a dollar left; not even my studs! See!' And he pointed
to his shirt-front hanging apart in a way I would never have looked
for in this reckless but fastidious gentleman. 'Yet if I had had a
dollar more or even a ring worth a dollar or so, I might have--
Theresa, have you any money at all? A coin now might save us.'
"Mrs. L'Hommedieu, who had turned alarmingly pale, drew up her fine
figure and resolutely confronted him. 'No!' said she, and shifting
her gaze she turned it meaningly upon me.
"He misunderstood this movement. Thinking it simply a reminder of my
presence, he turned, with his false but impressive show of courtesy,
and made me a low bow. Then he forgot me utterly again, and, facing
his wife, growled out:
"'Where are you going to get breakfast then? You don't look like a
woman who expects to starve!'
"It was a fatal remark, for, do what she would, she could not prevent
a slight smile of disdain, and, seeing it, he kept his eye riveted on
her face till her uneasiness became manifest. Instantly his
suspicion took form, and, surveying her still more fixedly, he espied
a corner of the precious envelope protruding slightly above her
corsage. To snatch it out, open it, and realize its value was the
work of a moment. Her cry of dismay and his shout of triumph rang
out simultaneously, and never have I seen such an ebullition of
opposing passions as I was made witness to as his hand closed over
this small fortune and their staring eyes met in the moral struggle
they had now entered upon for its ultimate possession.
"She was the first to speak. 'It was given to me; it was meant for
me. If I keep it both of us will profit by it, but if you--'
"He did not wait for her to finish. 'Where did you get it?' he
cried. 'I can break the bank with what I can raise on this bond at
the club. Darraugh's in town. You know what that means. Luck's in
the air, and with a hundred dollars-- But I've no time to talk. I
came for a dollar, a fifty-cent piece, a dime even, and go back with
a bond worth--'
"But she was already between him and the door. 'You will never carry
that bond out of this house,' she whispered in the tone which goes
further than a cry. 'I have not held it in my hand to see it follow
every other good thing I have had in life. I will not, Henry. Take
that bond and sink it as you have all the rest and I fall at your
feet a dead woman. I will never survive the destruction of my last
hope.'
"He was cowed--for a moment, that is; she looked so superb and so
determined. Then all that was mean and despicable in his thinly
veneered nature came to the surface, and, springing forward with an
oath, he was about to push her aside, when, without the moving of a
finger on her part, he reeled back, recovered himself, caught at a
chair, missed it, and fell heavily to the floor.
"'My God, I thank thee!' was the exclamation with which she broke
from the trance of terror into which she had been thrown by his
sudden attempt to pass her; and without a glance at his face, which
to me looked like the face of a dead man, she tore the paper from his
hand and stood looking about her with a wild and searching gaze, in
the desperate hope that somehow the walls would open and offer her a
safe place of concealment for the precious sheet of paper.
"Meanwhile I had crept near the prostrate man. He was breathing, but
was perfectly unconscious.
"'Don't you mean to do something for him?' I asked. 'He may die.'
"She met my question with the dazed air of one suddenly awakened.
'No, he'll not die; but he'll not come to for some minutes, and this
must be hidden first. But where? where? I cannot trust it on my
person or in any place a man like him would search. I must devise
some means--ah!'
"With this final exclamation she had dashed into the other room. I
did not see where she went--I did not want to--but I soon realized
she was working somewhere in a desperate hurry. I could hear her
breath coming in quick, short pants as I bent over her husband,
waiting for him to rouse and hating my inaction even while I
succumbed to it.
"Suddenly she was back in the parlor again, and to my surprise passed
immediately to the little table in the corner where we had sat at
supper. We had had for our simple refreshment that homeliest of all
dishes, boiled milk thickened with flour. There was still some left
in a bowl, and taking this away with her she called back hoarsely:
"'Pray that he does not come to till I have finished. It will be the
best prayer you ever made.'
"She told me afterward that he was subject to these attacks and that
she had long ceased to be alarmed by them. But to me the sight of
that man lying there so helpless was horrible, and, though I hated
him and pitied her, I scarcely knew what to wish. While battling
with my desire to run and the feeling of loyalty which held me
kneeling at that man's side, I heard her speak again, this time in an
even and slightly hard tone: 'Now you may dash a glass of cold water
in his face. I am prepared to meet him now. Happily his memory
fails after these attacks. I may succeed in making him believe that
the bond he saw was one of his fancies.'
"'Had you not better throw the water yourself?' I suggested, getting
up and meeting her eye very quietly.
"She looked at me in wonder, then moved calmly to the table, took the
glass, and dashed a few drops of water into her husband's face.
Instantly he began to stir, seeing which I arose without haste, but
without any unnecessary delay, and quickly took my leave. I could
bear no more that night.
"Next morning I awoke in a fright. I had dreamed that he had come to
my room in search of the bond. But it was only her knock at the door
and her voice asking if she might enter at this early hour. It was
such a relief I gladly let her in, and she entered with her best air
and flung herself on my little lounge with the hysterical cry:
"'He has sent me up. I told him I ought not to intrude at such an
inconvenient hour; that you would not have had your breakfast.' (How
carelessly she spoke! How hard she tried to keep the hungry note out
of her voice!) 'But he insisted on my coming up. I know why. He
searched me before I left the room, and now he wants to search the
room itself.'
"'Then he did remember?' I began.
"'Yes, he remembers now. I saw it in his eyes as soon as he awoke.
But he will not find the bond. That is safe, and some day when I
have escaped his vigilance long enough to get it back again I will
use it so as to make him comfortable as well as myself. I am not a
selfish woman."
"I did not think she was, and felt pity for her, and so after
dressing and making her a cup of tea, I sat down with her, and we
chatted for an hour or so quite comfortably. Then she grew so
restless and consulted the clock so often that I tried to soothe her
by remarking that it was not an easy task he had set himself, at
which she laughed in a mysterious way, but failed to grow less
anxious till our suspense was cut short by the appearance of the
janitor with a message from Mr. L'Hommedieu.
"'Mr. L'Hommedieu's compliments,' said he, 'and he hopes Mrs.
L'Hommedieu will make herself comfortable and not think of coming
down. He is doing everything that is necessary and will soon be
through. You can rest quite easy, ma'am.'
"'What does he mean?' marveled the poor woman as the janitor
disappeared. 'Is he spending all this time ransacking the rooms? I
wish I dared disobey him. I wish I dared go down.'
"But her courage was not equal to an open disregard of his wishes,
and she had to subdue her impatience and wait for a summons that did
not come till near two o'clock. Then Mr. L'Hommedieu himself
appeared with her hat and mantle on his arm.
"'My dear,' said he as she rose, haggard with excitement, to meet
him, 'I have brought your wraps with me that you may go directly from
here to our new home. Shall I assist you to put them on? You do not
look as well as usual, and that is why I have undertaken this thing
all myself--to save you, my dear; to save you each and every
exertion.'
"I had flung out my arms to catch her, for I thought she was going to
faint, but she did not, though I think it would have been better for
her if she had.
"'We are going to leave this house?' she asked, speaking very slowly
and with a studied lack of emotion that imposed upon nobody.
"'I have said so,' he smiled. 'The dray has already taken away the
half of our effects, and the rest will follow at Mrs. Latimer's
convenience.'
"'Ah, I understand!' she replied, with a gasp of relief significant
of her fear that by some superhuman cunning he had found the bond she
thought so safely concealed. 'I was wondering how Mrs. Latimer came
to allow us to leave.' (I tell you they always talked as if I were
not present.) 'Our goods are left as a surety, it seems.'
"'Half of our goods,' he blandly corrected. 'Would it interest you
to know which half?'
"The cunning of this insinuation was matched by the imperturbable
shrug with which she replied, 'So a bed has been allowed us and some
clothes I am satisfied,' at which he bit his lips, vexed at her
self-control and his own failure to break it.
"'You have not asked where we are going,' he observed, as with
apparent solicitude he threw her mantle over her shoulders.
"The air of lassitude with which she replied bespoke her feeling on
that point. 'I have little curiosity,' she said. 'You know I can be
happy anywhere.' And, turning toward me, she moved her lips in a way
I interpreted to mean: 'Go below with me. See me out.'
"'Say what you have to say to Miss Winterburn aloud,' he dryly
suggested.
"'I have nothing to say to Miss Winterburn but thanks,' was her cold
reply, belied, however, by the trembling of her fingers as she
essayed to fit on her gloves.
"'And those I will receive below!' I cried, with affected gaiety. 'I
am going down with you to the door.' And resolutely ignoring his
frown I tripped down before them. On the last stair I felt her steps
lagging. Instantly I seemed to comprehend what was required of me,
and, rushing forward, I entered the front parlor. He followed close
behind me, for how could he know I was not in collusion with her to
regain the bond? This gave her one minute by herself in the rear,
and in that minute she secured the key which would give her future
access to the spot where her treasure lay hidden.
"The rest of the story I must give you mainly from hearsay. You must
understand by this time what Mr. L'Hommedieu's scheme was in moving
so suddenly. He knew that it would be impossible for him, by the
most minute and continuous watchfulness, to prevent his wife from
recovering the bond while they continued to inhabit the rooms in
which, notwithstanding his failure to find it, he had reason to
believe it still lay concealed. But once in other quarters it would
be comparatively easy for him to subject her to a surveillance which
not only would prevent her from returning to this house without his
knowledge, but would lead her to give away her secret by the very
natural necessity she would be under of going to the exact spot where
her treasure lay hid.
"It was a cunning plot and showed him to be as able as he was
unscrupulous. How it worked I will now proceed to tell you. It must
have been the next afternoon that the janitor came running up to
me--I suppose he had learned by this time that I had more than
ordinary interest in these people--to say that Mrs. L'Hommedieu had
been in the house and had been so frightened by a man who had
followed her that she had fainted dead away on the floor. Would I go
down to her?
"I had rather have gone anywhere else, unless it was to prison; but
duty cannot be shirked, and I followed the man down. But we were too
late. Mrs. L'Hommedieu had recovered and gone away, and the person
who had frightened her was also gone, and only the hallboy remained
to give any explanations.
"This was what he had to say:
"'The man it was who went first. As soon as the lady fell he skipped
out. I don't think he meant no good here--'
"'Did she drop here in the hall?' I asked, unable to restrain my
intense anxiety.
"'Oh, no, ma'am! They was in the back room yonder, which she got in
somehow. The man followed her in, sneaking and sneaking like an eel
or a cop, and she fell right against--'
"'Don't tell me where?' I cried. 'I don't want to know where!' And
I was about to return upstairs when I heard a quick, sharp voice
behind me and realized that Mr. L'Hommedieu had come in and was
having some dispute with the janitor.
"Common prudence led me to listen. He wanted, as was very natural,
to enter the room where his wife had just been surprised, but the
janitor, alarmed by the foregoing very irregular proceedings, was
disposed to deny his right to do so.
"'The furniture is held as a surety,' said he, 'and I have orders--'
"But Mr. L'Hommedieu had a spare dollar, and before many minutes had
elapsed I heard him go into that room and close the door. Of the
next ten minutes and the suspense I felt I need not speak. When he
came out again, he looked as if the ground would not hold him.
"'I have done some mischief, I fear,' he airily said as he passed the
janitor. 'But I'll pay for it. Don't worry. I'll pay for it and
the rent, too, to-morrow. You may tell Mrs. Latimer so.' And he was
gone, leaving us all agape in the hallway.
"A minute later we all crept to that room and looked in. Now that he
had got the bond I for one was determined to know where she had hid
it. There was no mistaking the spot. A single glance was enough to
show us the paper ripped off from a portion of the wall, revealing a
narrow gap behind the baseboard large enough to hold the bond. It
was near--"
"Wait!" I put in as I remembered where the so-called Mrs. Helmuth had
pointed just before she died. "Wasn't it at the left of the large
folding doors and midway to the wall?"
"How came you to know?" she asked. "Did Mrs. Latimer tell you?" But
as I did not answer she soon took up the thread of her narrative
again, and, sighing softly, said:
The next day came and went, but no L'Hommedieu appeared; another, and
I began to grow seriously uneasy; a third, and a dreadful thing
happened. Late in the afternoon Mrs. L'Hommedieu, dressed very
oddly, came sliding in at the front door, and with an appealing smile
at the hallboy, who wished but dared not ask her for the key which
made these visits possible, glided by to her old rooms, and, finding
the door unlocked, went softly in. Her appearance is worth
description, for it shows the pitiful efforts she made at disguise,
in the hope, I suppose, of escaping the surveillance she was
evidently conscious of being under. She was in the habit of wearing
on cool days a black circular with a gray lining. This she had
turned inside out so that the gray was uppermost; while over her neat
black bonnet she had flung a long veil, also gray, which not only hid
her face, but gave her appearance an eccentric look as different as
possible from her usual aspect. The hallboy, who had never seen her
save in showy black or bright colors, said she looked like a ghost in
the daytime, but it was all done for a purpose, I am sure, and to
escape the attention of the man who had followed her before. Alas,
he might have followed her this time without addition to her
suffering! Scarcely had she entered the room where her treasure had
been left than she saw the torn paper and gaping baseboard, and,
uttering a cry so piercing it found its way even to the stolid heart
of the hallboy, she tottered back into the hall, where she fell into
the arms of her husband, who had followed her in from the street in a
state of frenzy almost equal to her own.
"The janitor, who that minute appeared on the stairway, says that he
never saw two such faces. They looked at each other and were
speechless. He was the first to hang his head.
"'It is gone, Henry,' she whispered. 'It is gone. You have taken
it.'
"He did not answer.
"'And it is lost! You have risked it, and it is lost?'
"He uttered a groan. 'You should have given it to me that night.
There was luck in the air then. Now the devil is in the cards and--'
"Her arms went up with a shriek. 'My curse be upon you, Henry
L'Hommedieu!' And whether it was the look with which she uttered
this imprecation, or whether there was some latent love left in his
heart for this long-suffering and once beautiful woman, he shrank at
her words, and stumbling like a man in the darkness, uttered a
heart-rending groan, and rushed from the house. We never saw him
again.
"As for her, she fell this time under a paralytic attack which robbed
her of her faculties. She was taken to a hospital, where I
frequently visited her, but either from grief or the effect of her
attack she did not know me, nor did she ever recognize any of us
again. Mrs. Latimer, who is a just woman, sold her furniture and,
after paying her self out of the proceeds, gave the remainder to the
hospital nurses for the use of Mrs. L'Hommedieu, so that when she
left them she had something with which to start life anew. But where
she went or how she managed to get along in her enfeebled condition I
do not know. I never heard of her again."
"Then you did not see the woman who died in these rooms?" I asked.
The effect of these words was magical and led to mutual explanations.
She had not seen that woman, having encountered all the sorrow she
wished to in that room. Nor was there any one else in the home at
this time likely to recognize Mrs. L'Hommedieu, the janitor and
hallboy both being new and Mrs. Latimer one of those proprietors who
are only seen on rent day. For the rest, Mrs. L'Hommedieu's
defective memory, which had led her to haunt the house and room where
the bond had once been hidden, accounted not only for her first
visit, but the last, which had ended so fatally. The cunning she
showed in turning her cloak and flinging a veil over her had was the
cunning of a partially clouded mind. It was a reminiscence of the
morning when her terrible misfortune occurred. My habit of taking
the key out of the lock of that unused door made the use of her own
key possible, and her fear of being followed caused her to lock the
door behind her. My wife, who must have fallen into a doze on my
leaving her, did not see her enter, but detected her just as she was
trying to escape through the folding doors. My presence in the
parlor probably added to her embarrassment, and she fled, turning her
cloak as she did so.
How simple it seemed now that we knew the facts; but how obscure,
and, to all appearance, unexplainable, before the clue was given to
the mystery!
The Thief
BY ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
"And now, if you have all seen the coin and sufficiently admired it,
you may pass it back. I make a point of never leaving it off the
shelf for more than fifteen minutes."
The half dozen or more guests seated about the hoard of the genial
speaker, glanced casually at each other as though expecting to see
the object mentioned immediately produced.
But no coin appeared.
"I have other amusements waiting," suggested their host, with a smile
in which even his wife could detect no signs of impatience. "Now let
Robert put it back into the cabinet."
Robert was the butler.
Blank looks, negative gestures, but still no coin.
"Perhaps it is in somebody's lap," timidly ventured one of the
younger women. "It doesn't seem to be on the table."
Immediately all the ladies began lifting their napkins and shaking
out the gloves which lay under them, in an effort to relieve their
own embarrassment and that of the gentlemen who had not even so
simple a resource as this at their command.
"It can't be lost," protested Mr. Sedgwick, with an air of perfect
confidence. "I saw it but a minute ago in somebody's hand. Darrow,
you had it; what did you do with it?"
"Passed it along."
"Well, well, it must be under somebody's plate or doily." And he
began to move about his own and such dishes as were within reach of
his hand.
Each guest imitated him, lifting glasses and turning over spoons till
Mr. Sedgwick himself bade them desist. "It's slipped to the floor,"
he nonchalantly concluded. "A toast to the ladies, and we will give
Robert the chance of looking for it."
As they drank this toast, his apparently careless, but quietly
astute, glance took in each countenance about him. The coin was very
valuable and its loss would be keenly felt by him. Had it slipped
from the table some one's eye would have perceived it, some hand
would have followed it. Only a minute or two before, the attention
of the whole party had been concentrated upon it. Darrow had held it
up for all to see, while he discoursed upon its history. He would
take Darrow aside at the first opportunity and ask him-- But--it!
how could he do that? These were his intimate friends. He knew them
well, more than well, with one exception, and he-- Well, he was the
handsomest of the lot and the most debonair and agreeable. A little
more gay than usual to-night, possibly a trifle too gay, considering
that a man of Mr. Blake's social weight and business standing sat at
the board; but not to be suspected, no, not to be suspected, even if
he was the next man after Darrow and had betrayed something like
confusion when the eyes of the whole table turned his way at the
former's simple statement of "I passed it on." Robert would find the
coin; he was a fool to doubt it; and if Robert did not, why, he would
simply have to pocket his chagrin, and not let a triviality like this
throw a shadow over his hospitality.
All this, while he genially lifted his glass and proposed the health
of the ladies. The constraint of the preceding moment was removed by
his manner, and a dozen jests caused as many merry laughs. Then he
pushed back his chair.
"And now, some music!" he cheerfully cried, as with lingering glances
and some further pokings about of the table furniture, the various
guests left their places and followed him into the adjoining room.
But the ladies were too nervous and the gentlemen not sufficiently
sure of their voices to undertake the entertainment of the rest at a
moment of such acknowledged suspense; and notwithstanding the
exertions of their host and his quiet but much discomfited wife, it
soon became apparent that but one thought engrossed them all, and
that any attempt at conversation must prove futile so long as the
curtains between the two rooms remained open and they could see
Robert on his hands and knees searching the floor and shoving aside
the rugs.
Darrow, who was Mr. Sedgwick's brother-in-law and almost as much at
home in the house as Sedgwick himself, made a move to draw these
curtains, but something in his relative's face stopped him and he
desisted with some laughing remark which did not attract enough
attention, even, to elicit any response.
"I hope his eyesight is good," murmured one of the young girls,
edging a trifle forward. "Mayn't I help him look? They say at home
that I am the only one in the house who can find anything."
Mr. Sedgwick smiled indulgently at the speaker (a round-faced,
round-eyed, merry-hearted girl whom in days gone by he had dandled on
his knees), but answered quite quickly for him:
"Robert will find it if it is there." Then, distressed at this
involuntary disclosure of his thought, added in his whole-hearted
way: "It's such a little thing, and the room is so big and a round
object rolls unexpectedly far, you know. Well, have you got it?" he
eagerly demanded, as the butler finally showed himself in the door.
"No, sir; and it's not in the dining-room. I have cleared the table
and thoroughly searched the floor."
Mr. Sedgwick knew that he had. He had no doubts about Robert.
Robert had been in his employ for years and had often handled his
coins and, at his order, sometimes shown them.
"Very well," said he, "we'll not bother about it any more to-night;
you may draw the curtains."
But here the clear, almost strident voice of the youngest man of the
party interposed.
"Wait a minute," said he. "This especial coin is the great treasure
of Mr. Sedgwick's valuable collection. It is unique in this country,
and not only worth a great deal of money, but cannot be duplicated at
any cost. There are only three of its stamp in the world. Shall we
let the matter pass, then, as though it were of small importance? I
feel that we cannot; that we are, in a measure, responsible for its
disappearance. Mr. Sedgwick handed it to us to look at, and while it
was going through our hands it vanished. What must he think? What
has he every right to think? I need not put it into words; you know
what you would think, what you could not help but think, if the
object were yours and it was lost in this way. Gentlemen--I leave
the ladies entirely out of this--I do not propose that he shall have
further opportunity to associate me with this very natural doubt. I
demand the privilege of emptying my pockets here and now, before any
of us have left his presence. I am a connoisseur in coins myself and
consequently find it imperative to take the initiative in this
matter. As I propose to spare the ladies, let us step back into the
dining-room. Mr. Sedgwick, pray don't deny me; I'm thoroughly in
earnest, I assure you."
The astonishment created by this audacious proposition was so great,
and the feeling it occasioned so intense, that for an instant all
stood speechless. Young Hammersley was a millionaire himself, and
generous to a fault, as all knew. Under no circumstances would any
one even suspect him of appropriating anything, great or small, to
which he had not a perfect right. Nor was he likely to imagine for a
moment that any one would. That he could make such a proposition
then, based upon any such plea, argued a definite suspicion in some
other quarter, which could not pass unrecognized. In vain Mr.
Sedgwick raised his voice in frank and decided protest, two of the
gentlemen had already made a quick move toward Robert, who still
stood, stupefied by the situation, with his hand on the cord which
controlled the curtains.
"He is quite right," remarked one of these, as he passed into the
dining-room. "I shouldn't sleep a wink to-night if this question
remained unsettled." The other, the oldest man present, the
financier of whose standing and highly esteemed character I have
already spoken, said nothing, but followed in a way to show that his
mind was equally made up.
The position in which Mr. Sedgwick found himself placed was far from
enviable. With a glance at the two remaining gentlemen, he turned
towards the ladies now standing in a close group at the other end of
the room. One of them was his wife, and he quivered internally as he
noted the deep red of her distressed countenance. But it was the
others he addressed, singling out, with the rare courtesy which was
his by nature, the one comparative stranger, Barrow's niece, a
Rochester girl, who could not be finding this, her first party in
Boston, very amusing.
"I hope you will appreciate the dilemma in which I have been placed
by these gentlemen," he began, "and will pardon--"
But here he noticed that she was not in the least attending; her eyes
were on the handsome figure of Hugh Clifford, her uncle's neighbor at
table, who in company with Mr. Hammersley was still hesitating in the
doorway. As Mr. Sedgwick stopped his useless talk, the two passed in
and the sound of her fluttering breath as she finally turned a
listening ear his way, caused him to falter as he repeated his
assurances and begged her indulgence.
She answered with some conventional phrase which he forgot while
crossing the room. But the remembrance of her slight satin-robed
figure, drawn up in an attitude whose carelessness was totally belied
by the anxiety of her half-averted glance, followed him into the
presence of the four men awaiting him. Four? I should say five, for
Robert was still there, though in a corner by himself, ready, no
doubt, to share any attempt which the others might make to prove
their innocence.
"The ladies will await us in the music-room," announced the host on
entering; and then paused, disconcerted by the picture suddenly
disclosed to his eye. On one side stood the two who had entered
first, with their eyes fixed in open sternness on young Clifford,
who, quite alone on the rug, faced them with a countenance of such
pronounced pallor that there seemed to be nothing else in the room.
As his features were singularly regular and his almost perfect mouth
accentuated by a smile as set as his figure was immobile, the effect
was so startling that not only Mr. Sedgwick, but every other person
present, no doubt, wished that the plow had never turned the furrow
which had brought this wretched coin to light.
However, the affair had gone too far now for retreat, as was shown by
Mr. Blake, the elderly financier whom all were ready to recognize as
the chief guest there. With an apologetic glance at Mr. Hammersley,
the impetuous young millionaire who had first proposed this
embarrassing procedure, he advanced to an empty side-table and began,
in a quiet, business-like way, to lay on it the contents of his
various pockets. As the pile rose, the silence grew, the act in
itself was so simple, the motive actuating it so serious and out of
accord with the standing of the company and the nature of the
occasion. When all was done, he stepped up to Mr. Sedgwick, with his
arms raised and held out from his body.
"Now accommodate me," said he, "by running your hands up and down my
chest. I have a secret pocket there which should be empty at this
time."
Mr. Sedgwick, fascinated by his look, did as he was bid, reporting
shortly:
"You are quite correct. I find nothing there."
Mr. Blake stepped back. As he did so, every eye, suddenly released
from his imposing figure, flashed towards the immovable Clifford, to
find him still absorbed by the action and attitude of the man who had
just undergone what to him doubtless appeared a degrading ordeal.
Pale before, he was absolutely livid now, though otherwise unchanged.
To break the force of what appeared to be an open, if involuntary,
self-betrayal, another guest stepped forward; but no sooner had he
raised his hand to his vest-pocket than Clifford moved, and in a
high, strident voice totally unlike his usual tones remarked:
"This is all--all--very interesting and commendable, no doubt. But
for such a procedure to be of any real value it should be entered
into by all. Gentlemen"--his rigidity was all gone now and so was
his pallor--"I am unwilling to submit myself to what, in my eyes, is
an act of unnecessary humiliation. Our word should be enough. I
have not the coin----" Stopped by the absolute silence, he cast a
distressed look into the faces about him, till it reached that of Mr.
Sedgwick, where it lingered, in an appeal to which that gentleman,
out of his great heart, instantly responded.
"One should take the word of the gentleman he invites to his house.
We will excuse you, and excuse all the others from the unnecessary
ceremony which Mr. Blake has been good enough to initiate."
But this show of favor was not to the mind of the last-mentioned
gentleman, and met with instant reproof.
"Not so fast, Sedgwick. I am the oldest man here and I did not feel
it was enough simply to state that this coin was not on my person.
As to the question of humiliation, it strikes me that humiliation
would lie, in this instance, in a refusal for which no better excuse
can be given than the purely egotistical one of personal pride."
At this attack, the fine head of Clifford rose, and Darrow,
remembering the girl within, felt instinctively grateful that she was
not here to note the effect it gave to his person.
"I regret to differ," said he. "To me no humiliation could equal
that of demonstrating in this open manner the fact of one's not being
a thief."
Mr. Blake gravely surveyed him. Tor some reason the issue seemed no
longer to lie between Clifford and the actual loser of the coin, but
between him and his fellow guest, this uncompromising banker.
"A thief!" repeated the young man, in an indescribable tone full of
bitterness and scorn.
Mr. Blake remained unmoved; he was a just man but strict, hard to
himself, hard to others. But he was not entirely without heart.
Suddenly his expression lightened. A certain possible explanation of
the other's attitude had entered his mind.
"Young men sometimes have reasons for their susceptibilities which
the old forget. If you have such--if you carry a photograph, believe
that we have no interest in pictures of any sort to-night and
certainly would fail to recognize them."
A smile of disdain flickered across the young man's lip. Evidently
it was no discovery of this kind that he feared.
"I carry no photographs," said he; and, bowing low to his host, he
added in a measured tone which but poorly hid his profound agitation,
"I regret to have interfered in the slightest way with the pleasure
of the evening. If you will be so good as to make my excuses to the
ladies, I will withdraw from a presence upon which I have made so
poor an impression."
Mr. Sedgwick prized his coin and despised deceit, but he could not
let a guest leave him in this manner. Instinctively he held out his
hand. Proudly young Clifford dropped his own into it; but the lack
of mutual confidence was felt and the contact was a cold one. Half
regretting his impulsive attempt at courtesy, Mr. Sedgwick drew back,
and Clifford was already at the door leading into the hall, when
Hammersley, who by his indiscreet proposition had made all this
trouble for him, sprang forward and caught him by the arm.
"Don't go," he whispered. "You're done for if you leave like this.
I--I was a brute to propose such an asinine thing, but having done so
I am bound to see you out of the difficulty. Come into the adjoining
room--there is nobody there at present--and we will empty our pockets
together and find this lost article if we can. I may have pocketed
it myself, in a fit of abstraction."
Did the other hesitate? Some thought so; but, if he did, it was but
momentarily.
"I cannot," he muttered; "think what you will of me, but let me go."
And dashing open the door he disappeared from their sight just as
light steps and the rustle of skirts were heard again in the
adjoining room.
"There are the ladies. What shall we say to them?" queried Sedgwick,
stepping slowly towards the intervening curtains.
"Tell them the truth," enjoined Mr. Blake, as he hastily repocketed
his own belongings. "Why should a handsome devil like that be
treated with any more consideration than another? He has a secret if
he hasn't a coin. Let them know this. It may save some one a future
heartache."
The last sentence was muttered, but Mr. Sedgwick heard it. Perhaps
that was why his first movement on entering the adjoining room was to
cross over to the cabinet and shut and lock the heavily paneled door
which had been left standing open. At all events, the action drew
general attention and caused an instant silence, broken the next
minute by an ardent cry:
"So your search was futile?"
It came from the lady least known, the interesting young stranger
whose personality had made so vivid an impression upon him.
"Quite so," he answered, hastily facing her with an attempted smile.
"The gentlemen decided not to carry matters to the length first
proposed. The object was not worth it. I approved their decision.
This was meant for a joyous occasion. Why mar it by unnecessary
unpleasantness?"
She had given him her full attention while he was speaking, but her
eye wandered away the moment he had finished and rested searchingly
on the other gentlemen. Evidently she missed a face she had expected
to find there, for her color changed and she drew back behind the
other ladies with the light, unmusical laugh women, sometimes use to
hide a secret emotion.
It brought Mr. Darrow forward.
"Some were not willing to subject themselves to what they considered
an unnecessary humiliation," he curtly remarked. "Mr. Clifford--"
"There! let us drop it," put in his brother-in-law. "I've lost my
coin and that's the end of it. I don't intend to have the evening
spoiled for a thing like that. Music! ladies, music and a jolly air!
No more dumps." And with as hearty a laugh as he could command in
face of the somber looks he encountered on every side, he led the way
back into the music-room.
Once there the women seemed to recover their spirits; that is, such
as remained. One had disappeared. A door opened from this room into
the main hall and through this a certain young lady had vanished
before the others had had time to group themselves about the piano.
We know who this lady was; possibly, we know, too, why her hostess
did not follow her.
Meanwhile, Mr. Clifford had gone upstairs for his coat and was
lingering there, the prey of some very bitter reflections. Though he
had encountered nobody on the stairs, and neither heard nor saw any
one in the halls, he felt confident that he was not unwatched. He
remembered the look on the butler's face as he tore himself away from
Hammersley's restraining hand, and he knew what that fellow thought
and also was quite able to guess what that fellow would do, if his
suspicions were farther awakened. This conviction brought an odd and
not very open smile to his face, as he finally turned to descend the
one flight which separated him from the front door he was so ardently
desirous of closing behind him for ever.
A moment and he would be down; but the steps were many and seemed to
multiply indefinitely as he sped below. Should his departure be
noted, and some one advance to detain him! He fancied he heard a
rustle in the open space under the stairs. Were any one to step
forth, Robert or-- With a start, he paused and clutched the
banister. Some one had stepped forth; a woman! The swish of her
skirts was unmistakable. He felt the chill of a new dread. Never in
his short but triumphant career had he met coldness or disapproval in
the eye of a woman. Was he to encounter it now? If so, it would go
hard with him. He trembled as he turned his head to see which of the
four it was. If it should prove to be his hostess-- But it was not
she; it was Darrow's young friend, the pretty inconsequent girl he
had chatted with at the dinner-table, and afterwards completely
forgotten in the events which had centered all his thoughts upon
himself. And she was standing there, waiting for him! He would have
to pass her,--notice her,--speak.
But when the encounter occurred and their eyes met, he failed to find
in hers any sign of the disapproval he feared, but instead a
gentlewomanly interest which he might interpret deeply, or otherwise,
according to the measure of his need.
That need seemed to be a deep one at this instant, for his
countenance softened perceptibly as he took her quietly extended hand.
"Good-night," she said; "I am just going myself," and with an
entrancing smile of perfect friendliness, she fluttered past him up
the stairs.
It was the one and only greeting which his sick heart could have
sustained without flinching. Just this friendly farewell of one
acquaintance to another, as though no change had taken place in his
relations to society and the world. And she was a woman and not a
thoughtless girl! Staring after her slight, elegant figure, slowly
ascending the stair, he forgot to return her cordial greeting. What
delicacy, and yet what character there was in the poise of her
spirited head! He felt his breath fail him, in his anxiety for
another glance from her eye, for some sign, however small, that she
had carried the thought of him up those few, quickly mounted steps.
Would he get it? She is at the bend of the stair; she pauses--turns,
a nod--and she is gone.
With an impetuous gesture, he dashed from the house.
In the drawing-room the noise of the closing door was heard, and a
change at once took place in the attitude and expression of all
present. The young millionaire approached Mr. Sedgwick and
confidentially remarked:
"There goes your precious coin. I'm sure of it. I even think I can
tell the exact place in which it is hidden. His hand went to his
left coat-pocket once too often."
"That's right. I noticed the action also," chimed in Mr. Darrow, who
had stepped up, unobserved. "And I noticed something else. His
whole appearance altered from the moment this coin came on the scene.
An indefinable half-eager, half-furtive look crept into his eye as he
saw it passed from hand to hand. I remember it now, though it didn't
make much impression upon me at the time."
"And I remember another thing," supplemented Hammersley in his
anxiety to set himself straight with these men of whose entire
approval he was not quite sure. "He raised his napkin to his mouth
very frequently during the meal and held it there longer than is
usual, too. Once he caught me looking at him, and for a moment he
flushed scarlet, then he broke out with one of his witty remarks and
I had to laugh like everybody else. If I am not mistaken, his napkin
was up and his right hand working behind it, about the time Mr.
Sedgwick requested the return of his coin."
"The idiot! Hadn't he sense enough to know that such a loss wouldn't
pass unquestioned? The gem of the collection; known all over the
country, and he's not even a connoisseur."
"No; I've never even heard him mention numismatics."
"Mr. Darrow spoke of its value. Perhaps that was what tempted him.
I know that Clifford's been rather down on his luck lately."
"He? Well, he don't look it. There isn't one of us so well set up.
Pardon me, Mr. Hammersley, you understand what I mean. He perhaps
relies a little bit too much on his fine clothes."
"He needn't. His face is his fortune--all the one he's got, I hear
it said. He had a pretty income from Consolidated Silver, but that's
gone up and left him in what you call difficulties. If he has debts
besides--"
But here Mr. Darrow was called off. His niece wanted to see him for
one minute in the hall. When he came back it was to make his adieu
and hers. She had been taken suddenly indisposed and his duty was to
see her immediately home. This broke up the party, and amid general
protestations the various guests were taking their leave when the
whole action was stopped by a smothered cry from the dining-room, and
the precipitate entrance of Robert, asking for Mr. Sedgwick.
"What's up? What's happened?" demanded that gentleman, hurriedly
advancing towards the agitated butler.
"Found!" he exclaimed, holding up the coin between his thumb and
forefinger. "It was standing straight up between two leaves of the
table. It tumbled and fell to the floor as Luke and I were taking
them out."
Silence which could be felt for a moment. Then each man turned and
surveyed his neighbor, while the women's voices rose in little cries
that were almost hysterical.
"I knew that it would be found, and found here," came from the
hallway in rich, resonant tones. "Uncle, do not hurry; I am feeling
better," followed in unconscious naïveté, as the young girl stepped
in, showing a countenance in which were small signs of indisposition
or even of depressed spirits.
Mr. Darrow, with a smile of sympathetic understanding, joined the
others now crowding about the butler.
"I noticed the crack between these two leaves when I pushed about the
plates and dishes," he was saying. "But I never thought of looking
in it for the missing coin. I'm sure I'm very sorry that I didn't."
Mr. Darrow, to whom these words had recalled a circumstance he had
otherwise, completely forgotten, anxiously remarked: "That must have
happened shortly after it left my hand. I recall now that the lady
sitting between me and Clifford gave it a twirl which sent it
spinning over the bare table-top. I don't think she realized the
notion. She was listening--we all were--to a flow of bright
repartee, going on below us, and failed to follow the movements of
the coin. Otherwise, she would have spoken. But what a marvel that
it should have reached that crack in just the position to fall in!"
"It wouldn't happen again, not if we spun it there for a month of
Sundays."
"But Mr. Clifford!" put in an agitated voice.
"Yes, it has been rather hard on him. But he shouldn't have such
keen sensibilities. If he had emptied out his pockets cheerfully and
at the first intimation, none of this unpleasantness would have
happened. Mr. Sedgwick, I congratulate you upon the recovery of this
valuable coin, and am quite ready to offer my services if you wish to
make Mr. Clifford immediately acquainted with Robert's discovery."
"Thank you, but I will perform that duty myself," was Mr. Sedgwick's
quiet rejoinder, as he unlocked the door of his cabinet and carefully
restored the coin to its proper place.
When he faced back, he found his guests on the point of leaving.
Only one gave of any intention of lingering.
This was the elderly financier who had shown such stern resolve in
the treatment of Mr. Clifford's so-called sensibilities. He had
confided his wife to the care of Mr. Darrow, and now met Mr. Sedgwick
with this remark:
"I'm going to ask a favor of you. If, as you have intimated, it is
your intention to visit Mr. Clifford to-night, I should like to go
with you. I don't understand this young man and his unaccountable
attitude in this matter, and it is very important that I should.
Have you any objection to my company? My motor is at the door, and
we can settle the affair in twenty minutes."
"None," returned his host, a little surprised, however, at the
request. "His pride does seem a little out of place, but he was
among comparative strangers, and seemed to feel his honor greatly
impugned by Hammersley's unfortunate proposition. I'm sorry way down
to the ground for what has occurred, and cannot carry him our
apologies too soon."
"No, you cannot," retorted the other shortly. And so seriously did
he utter this that no time was lost by Mr. Sedgwick, and as soon as
they could get into their coats, they were in the motor and on their
way to the young man's apartment.
Their experience began at the door. A man was lolling there who told
them that Mr. Clifford had changed his quarters; where he did not
know. But upon the production of a five-dollar bill, he remembered
enough about it to give them a number and street where possibly they
might find him. In a rush, they hastened there; only to hear the
same story from the sleepy elevator boy anticipating his last trip up
for the night.
"Mr. Clifford left a week ago; he didn't tell me where he was going."
Nevertheless the boy knew; that they saw, and another but smaller
bill came into requisition and awoke his sleepy memory.
The street and number which he gave made the two well-to-do men
stare. But they said nothing, though the looks they cast back at the
second-rate quarters they were leaving, so far below the elegant
apartment house they had visited first, were sufficiently expressive.
The scale of descent from luxury to positive discomfort was proving a
rapid one and prepared them for the dismal, ill-cared-for, altogether
repulsive doorway before which they halted next. No attendant waited
here; not even an elevator boy; the latter for the good reason that
there was no elevator. An uninviting flight of stairs was before
them; and on the few doors within sight a simple card showed the name
of the occupant.
Mr. Sedgwick glanced at his companion.
"Shall we go up?" he asked.
Mr. Blake nodded. "We'll find him," said he, "if it takes all night."
"Surely he cannot have sunk lower than this."
"Remembering his get-up, I do not think so. Yet who knows? Some
mystery lies back of his whole conduct. Dining in your home, with
this to come back to! I don't wonder--"
But here a thought struck him. Pausing with his foot on the stair,
he turned a flushed countenance towards Mr. Sedgwick. "I've an
idea," said he. "Perhaps--" He whispered the rest.
Mr. Sedgwick stared and shook his shoulders. "Possibly," said he,
flushing slightly in his turn. Then, as they proceeded up, "I feel
like a brute, anyway. A sorry night's business all through, unless
the end proves better than the beginning."
"We'll start from the top. Something tells me that we shall find him
close under the roof. Can you read the names by such a light?"
"Barely; but I have matches."
And now there might have been witnessed by any chance home-comer the
curious sight of two extremely well-dressed men pottering through the
attic hall of this decaying old domicile, reading the cards on the
doors by means of a lighted match.
And vainly. On none of the cards could be seen the name they sought.
"We're on the wrong track," protested Mr. Blake. "No use keeping
this up," but found himself stopped, when about to turn away, by a
gesture of Sedgwick's.
"There's a light under the door you see there untagged," said he.
"I'm going to knock."
He did so. There was a sound within and then utter silence.
He knocked again. A man's step was heard approaching the door, then
again the silence.
Mr. Sedgwick made a third essay, and then the door was suddenly
pulled inward and in the gap they saw the handsome face and graceful
figure of the young man they had so lately encountered amid palatial
surroundings. But how changed! how openly miserable! and when he saw
who his guests were, how proudly defiant of their opinion and
presence.
"You have found the coin," he quietly remarked. "I appreciate your
courtesy in coming here to inform me of it. Will not that answer,
without further conversation? I am on the point of retiring
and--and--"
Even the hardihood of a very visible despair gave way for an instant
as he met Mr. Sedgwick's eye. In the break which followed, the older
man spoke.
"Pardon us, but we have come thus far with a double purpose. First,
to tender our apologies, which you have been good enough to accept;
secondly, to ask, in no spirit of curiosity, I assure you, a question
that I seem to see answered, but which I should be glad to hear
confirmed by your lips. May we not come in?"
The question was put with a rare smile such as sometimes was seen on
this hard-grained handler of millions, and the young man, seeing it,
faltered back, leaving the way open for them to enter. The next
minute he seemed to regret the impulse, for backing against a
miserable table they saw there, he drew himself up with an air as
nearly hostile as one of his nature could assume.
"I know of no question," said he, "which I feel at this very late
hour inclined to answer. A man who has been tracked as I must have
been for you to find me here, is hardly in a mood to explain his
poverty or the mad desire for former luxuries which took him to the
house of one friendly enough, he thought, to accept his presence
without inquiry as to the place he lived in or the nature or number
of the reverses which had brought him to such a place as this."
"I do not--believe me--" faltered Mr. Sedgwick, greatly embarrassed
and distressed. In spite of the young man's attempt to hide the
contents of the table, he had seen the two objects lying there--a
piece of bread or roll, and a half-cocked revolver.
Mr. Blake had seen them, too, and at once took the word out of his
companion's mouth.
"You mistake us," he said coldly, "as well as the nature of our
errand. We are here from no motive of curiosity, as I have before
said, nor from any other which might offend or distress you. We--or
rather I am here on business. I have a position to offer to an
intelligent, upright, enterprising young man. Your name has been
given me. It was given me before this dinner, to which I went--if
Mr. Sedgwick will pardon my plain speaking--chiefly for the purpose
of making your acquaintance. The result was what you know, and
possibly now you can understand my anxiety to see you exonerate
yourself from the doubts you yourself raised by your attitude of
resistance to the proposition made by that headlong, but
well-meaning, young man of many millions, Mr. Hammersley. I wanted
to find in you the honorable characteristics necessary to the man who
is to draw an eight thousand dollars a year salary under my eye. I
still want to do this. If then you are willing to make this whole
thing plain to me--for it is not plain--not wholly plain, Mr.
Clifford--then you will find in me a friend such as few young fellows
can boast of, for I like you--I will say that--and where I like--"
The gesture with which he ended the sentence was almost superfluous,
in face of the change which had taken place in the aspect of the man
he addressed. Wonder, doubt, hope, and again incredulity were lost
at last in a recognition of the other's kindly intentions toward
himself, and the prospects which they opened out before him. With a
shame-faced look, and yet with a manly acceptance of his own
humiliation that was not displeasing to his visitors, he turned about
and pointing to the morsel of bread lying on the table before them,
he said to Mr. Sedgwick:
"Do you recognize that? It is from your table, and--and--it is not
the only piece I had hidden in my pockets. I had not eaten in
twenty-four hours when I sat down to dinner this evening. I had no
prospect of another morsel for to-morrow and--and--I was afraid of
eating my fill--there were ladies--and so--and so--"
They did not let him finish. In a flash they had both taken in the
room. Not an article which could be spared was anywhere visible.
His dress-suit was all that remained to him of former ease and
luxury. That he had retained, possibly for just such opportunities
as had given him a dinner to-night. Mr. Blake understood at last,
and his iron lip trembled.
"Have you no friends?" he asked. "Was it necessary to go hungry?"
"Could I ask alms or borrow what I could not pay? It was a position
I was after, and positions do not come at call. Sometimes they come
without it," he smiled with the dawning of his old-time grace on his
handsome face, "but I find that one can see his resources go, dollar
by dollar, and finally, cent by cent, in the search for employment no
one considers necessary to a man like me. Perhaps if I had had less
pride, had been willing to take you or any one else into my
confidence, I might not have sunk to these depths of humiliation; but
I had not the confidence in men which this last half hour has given
me, and I went blundering on, hiding my needs and hoping against hope
for some sort of result to my efforts. This pistol is not mine. I
did borrow this, but I did not mean to use it, unless nature reached
the point where it could stand no more. I thought the time had come
to-night when I left your house, Mr. Sedgwick, suspected of theft.
It seemed the last straw; but--but--a woman's look has held me back.
I hesitated and--now you know the whole," said he; "that is, if you
can understand why it was more possible for me to brave the contumely
of such a suspicion than to open my pockets and disclose the crusts I
had hidden there."
"I can understand," said Mr. Sedgwick; "but the opportunity you have
given us for doing so must not be shared by others. We will
undertake your justification, but it must be made in our own way and
after the most careful consideration; eh, Mr. Blake?"
"Most assuredly; and if Mr. Clifford will present himself at my
office early in the morning, we will first breakfast and then talk
business."
Young Clifford could only hold out his hand, but when, his two
friends gone, he sat in contemplation of his changed prospects, one
word and one only left his lips, uttered in every inflection of
tenderness, hope, and joy. "Edith! Edith! Edith!"
It was the name of the sweet young girl who had shown her faith in
him at the moment when his heart was lowest and despair at its
culmination.
Midnight in Beauchamp Row
BY ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
It was the last house in Beauchamp Row, and it stood several rods
away from its nearest neighbor. It was a pretty house in the
daytime, but owing to its deep, sloping roof and small bediamonded
windows it had a lonesome look at night, notwithstanding the crimson
hall-light which shone through the leaves of its vine-covered doorway.
Ned Chivers lived in it with his six months' married bride, and as he
was both a busy fellow and a gay one there were many evenings when
pretty Letty Chivers sat alone until near midnight.
She was of an uncomplaining spirit, however, and said little, though
there were times when both the day and evening seemed very long and
married life not altogether the paradise she had expected.
On this evening--a memorable evening for her, the 24th of December,
1911--she had expected her husband to remain with her, for it was not
only Christmas eve, but the night when, as manager of a large
manufacturing concern, he brought up from New York the money with
which to pay off the men on the next working day, and he never left
her when there was any unusual amount of money in the house. But
with the first glimpse she had of his figure coming up the road she
saw that for some reason it was not to be thus to-night, and,
indignant, alarmed almost, at the prospect of a lonesome evening
under such circumstances, she ran hastily down to the gate to meet
him, crying:
"Oh, Ned, you look so troubled I know you have only come home for a
hurried supper. But you cannot leave me to-night. Tennie" (their
only maid) "has gone for a holiday, and I never can stay in this
house alone with all that." She pointed to the small bag he carried,
which, as she knew, was filled to bursting with bank notes.
He certainly looked troubled. It is hard to resist the entreaty in a
young bride's uplifted face. But this time he could not help
himself, and he said:
"I am dreadfully sorry, but I must ride over to Fairbanks to-night.
Mr. Pierson has given me an imperative order to conclude a matter of
business there, and it is very important that it should be done. I
should lose my position if I neglected the matter, and no one but
Hasbrouck and Suffern knows that we keep the money in the house. I
have always given out that I intrusted it to Hale's safe over night."
"But I cannot stand it," she persisted. "You have never left me on
these nights. That is why I let Tennie go. I will spend the evening
at The Larches, or, better still, call in Mr. and Mrs. Talcott to
keep me company."
But her husband did not approve of her going out or of her having
company. The Larches was too far away, and as for Mr. and Mrs.
Talcott, they were meddlesome people, whom he had never liked;
besides, Mrs. Talcott was delicate, and the night threatened storm.
Let her go to bed like a good girl, and think nothing about the
money, which he would take care to put away in a very safe place.
"Or," said he, kissing her downcast face, "perhaps you would rather
hide it yourself; women always have curious ideas about such things."
"Yes, let me hide it," she entreated. "The money, I mean, not the
bag. Every one knows the bag. I should never dare to leave it in
that." And begging him to unlock it, she began to empty it with a
feverish haste that rather alarmed him, for he surveyed her anxiously
and shook his head as if he dreaded the effects of this excitement
upon her.
But as he saw no way out of the difficulty, he confined himself to
using such soothing words as were at his command, and then, humoring
her weakness, helped her to arrange the bills in the place she had
chosen, and restuffing the bag with old receipts till it acquired its
former dimensions, he put a few bills on top to make the whole look
natural, and, laughing at her white face, relocked the bag and put
the key back in his pocket.
"There, dear; a notable scheme and one that should relieve your mind
entirely!" he cried. "If any one should attempt burglary in my
absence and should succeed in getting into a house as safely locked
as this will be when I leave it, then trust to their being satisfied
when they see this booty, which I shall hide where I always hide
it--in the cupboard over my desk."
"And when will you be back?" she questioned, trembling in spite of
herself at these preparations.
"By one o'clock if possible. Certainly by two."
"And our neighbors go to bed at ten," she murmured. But the words
were low, and she was glad he did not hear them, for if it was his
duty to obey the orders he had received, then it was her duty to meet
the position in which it left her as bravely as she could.
At supper she was so natural that his face rapidly brightened, and it
was with quite an air of cheerfulness that he rose at last to lock up
the house and make such preparations as were necessary for his dismal
ride over the mountains to Fairbanks. She had the supper dishes to
wash up in Tennie's absence, and as she was a busy little housewife
she found herself singing a snatch of song as she passed back and
forth from dining-room to kitchen. He heard it, too, and smiled to
himself as he bolted the windows on the ground floor and examined the
locks of the three lower doors, and when he finally came into the
kitchen with his greatcoat on to give her his final kiss, he had but
one parting injunction to urge, and this was for her to lock and bolt
the front door after him and then forget the whole matter till she
heard his double knock at midnight.
She smiled and held up her ingenuous face.
"Be careful of yourself," she begged of him. "I hate this dark ride
for you, and on such a night too." And she ran with him to the door
to look out.
"It is certainly very dark," he responded, "but I'm to have one of
Brown's safest horses. Do not worry about me. I shall do well
enough, and so will you, too, or you are not the plucky little woman
I have always thought you."
She laughed, but there was a choking sound in her voice that made him
look at her again. But at sight of his anxiety she recovered
herself, and pointing to the clouds said earnestly:
"It's going to snow. Be careful as you ride by the gorge, Ned; it is
very deceptive there in a snowstorm."
But he vowed that it would not snow before morning and giving her one
final embrace he dashed down the path toward Brown's livery stable.
"Oh, what is the matter with me?" she murmured to herself as his
steps died out in the distance. "I never knew I was such a coward."
And she paused for a moment, looking up and down the road, as if in
despite of her husband's command she had the desperate idea of
running away to some neighbor.
But she was too loyal for that, and smothering a sigh she retreated
into the house. As she did so the first flakes fell of the storm
that was not to have come till morning.
It took her an hour to get her kitchen in order, and nine o'clock
struck before she was ready to sit down. She had been so busy she
had not noticed how the wind had increased or how rapidly the snow
was falling. But when she went to the front door for another glance
up and down the road she started back, appalled at the fierceness of
the gale and at the great pile of snow that had already accumulated
on the doorstep.
Too delicate to breast such a wind, she saw herself robbed of her
last hope of any companionship, and sighing heavily she locked and
bolted the door for the night and went back into her little
sitting-room, where a great fire was burning. Here she sat down, and
determined, since she must pass the evening alone, to do it as
cheerfully as possible, she began to sew. "Oh, what a Christmas
eve!" she thought, as a picture of other homes rose before her
eyes--homes in which husbands sat by wives and brothers by sisters;
and a great wave of regret poured over her and a longing for
something, she hardly dared say what, lest her unhappiness should
acquire a sting that would leave traces beyond the passing moment.
The room in which she sat was the only one on the ground floor except
the dining-room and kitchen. It therefore was used both as parlor
and sitting-room, and held not only her piano, but her husband's desk.
Communicating with it was the tiny dining-room. Between the two,
however, was an entry leading to a side entrance. A lamp was in this
entry, and she had left it burning, as well as the one in the
kitchen, that the house might look cheerful and as if the whole
family were at home.
She was looking toward this entry and wondering what made it seem so
dismally dark to her, when there came a faint sound from the door at
its further end.
Knowing that her husband must have taken peculiar pains with the
fastenings of this door, as it was the one toward the woods and
therefore most accessible to wayfarers, she sat where she was, with
all her faculties strained to listen. But no further sound came from
that direction, and after a few minutes of silent terror she was
allowing herself to believe that she had been deceived by her fears
when she suddenly heard the same sound at the kitchen door, followed
by a muffled knock.
Frightened now in good earnest, but still alive to the fact that the
intruder was as likely to be a friend as foe, she stepped to the
door, and with her hand on the lock stooped and asked boldly enough
who was there. But she received no answer, and more affected by this
unexpected silence than by the knock she had heard, she recoiled
farther and farther till not only the width of the kitchen, but the
dining-room also, lay between her and the scene of her alarm, when to
her utter contusion the noise shifted again to the side of the house,
and the door she thought so securely fastened swung violently open as
if blown in by a fierce gust, and she saw precipitated into the entry
the burly figure of a man covered with snow and shaking with the
violence of the storm that seemed at once to fill the house.
Her first thought was that it was her husband come back, but before
she could clear her eyes from the snow which had rushed tumultuously
in, he had thrown off his outer covering and she found herself face
to face with a man in whose powerful frame and cynical visage she saw
little to comfort her and much to surprise and alarm.
"Ugh!" was his coarse and rather familiar greeting. "A hard night,
missus! Enough to drive any man indoors. Pardon the liberty, but I
couldn't wait for you to lift the latch; the wind drove me right in."
"Was--was not the door locked?" she feebly asked, thinking he must
have staved it in with his foot, which was certainly well fitted for
such a task.
"Not much," he chuckled. "I s'pose you're too hospitable for that."
And his eyes passed from her face to the comfortable firelight
shining through the sitting-room.
"Is it refuge you want?" she demanded, suppressing as much as
possible all signs of fear.
"Sure, missus--what else! A man can't live in a gale like that,
specially after a tramp of twenty miles or more. Shall I shut the
door for you?" he asked, with a mixture of bravado and good nature
that frightened her more and more.
"I will shut it," she replied, with a half notion of escaping this
sinister stranger by a flight through the night.
But one glance into the swirling snowstorm deterred her, and making
the best of the alarming situation, she closed the door, but did not
lock it, being now more afraid of what was inside the house than of
anything left lingering without.
The man, whose clothes were dripping with water, watched her with a
cynical smile, and then, without any invitation, entered the
dining-room, crossed it, and moved toward the kitchen fire.
"Ugh! ugh! But it is warm here!" he cried, his nostrils dilating
with an animal-like enjoyment, that in itself was repugnant to her
womanly delicacy. "Do you know, missus, I shall have to stay here
all night? Can't go out in that gale again; not such a fool." Then
with a sly look at her trembling form and white face he insinuatingly
added, "All alone, missus?"
The suddenness with which this was put, together with the leer that
accompanied it, made her start. Alone? Yes, but should she
acknowledge it? Would it not be better to say her husband was
upstairs? The man evidently saw the struggle going on in her mind,
for he chuckled to himself and called out quite boldly:
"Never mind, missus; it's all right. Just give me a bit of cold meat
and a cup of tea or something, and we'll be very comfortable
together. You're a slender slip of a woman to be minding a house
like this. I'll keep you company if you don't mind, leastwise until
the storm lets up a bit, which ain't likely for some hours to come.
Rough night, missus, rough night."
"I expect my husband home at any time," she hastened to say. And
thinking she saw a change in the man's countenance at this she put on
quite an air of sudden satisfaction and bounded toward the front of
the house. "There! I think I hear him now," she cried.
Her motive was to gain time, and if possible to obtain the
opportunity of shifting the money from the place where she had first
put it into another and safer one. "I want to be able," she thought,
"to swear that I have no money with me in this house. If I can only
get it into my apron I will drop it outside the door into the snow
bank. It will be as safe there as in the vaults it came from." And
dashing into the sitting-room she made a feint of dragging down a
shawl from a screen, while she secretly filled her skirt with the
bills which had been put between some old pamphlets on the
bookshelves.
She could hear the man grumbling in the kitchen, but he did not
follow her front, and taking advantage of the moment's respite from
his none too encouraging presence she unbarred the door and
cheerfully called out her husband's name.
The ruse was successful. She was enabled to fling the notes where
the falling flakes would soon cover them from sight, and feeling more
courageous, now that the money was out of the house, she went slowly
back, saying she had made a mistake, and that it was the wind she had
heard.
The man gave a gruff but knowing guffaw and then resumed his watch
over her, following her steps as she proceeded to set him out a meal,
with a persistency that reminded her of a tiger just on the point of
springing. But the inviting look of the viands with which she was
rapidly setting the table soon distracted his attention, and allowing
himself one grunt of satisfaction, he drew up a chair and set himself
down to what to him was evidently a most savory repast.
"No beer? No ale? Nothing o' that sort, eh? Don't keep a bar?" he
growled, as his teeth closed on a huge hunk of bread.
She shook her head, wishing she had a little cold poison bottled up
in a tight-looking jug.
"Nothing but tea," she smiled, astonished at her own ease of manner
in the presence of this alarming guest.
"Then let's have that," he grumbled, taking the bowl she handed him,
with an odd look that made her glad to retreat to the other side of
the room.
"Jest listen to the howling wind," he went on between the huge
mouthfuls of bread and cheese with which he was gorging himself.
"But we're very comfortable, we two! We don't mind the storm, do we?"
Shocked by his familiarity and still more moved by the look of
mingled inquiry and curiosity with which his eyes now began to wander
over the walls and cupboards, she hurried to the window overlooking
her nearest neighbor, and, lifting the shade, peered out. A swirl of
snowflakes alone confronted her. She could neither see her
neighbors, nor could she be seen by them. A shout from her to them
would not be heard. She was as completely isolated as if the house
stood in the center of a desolate western plain.
"I have no trust but in God," she murmured as she came from the
window. And, nerved to meet her fate, she crossed to the kitchen.
It was now half-past ten. Two hours and a half must elapse before
her husband could possibly arrive.
She set her teeth at the thought and walked resolutely into the room.
"Are you done?" she asked.
"I am, ma'am," he leered. "Do you want me to wash the dishes? I
kin, and I will." And he actually carried his plate and cup to the
sink, where he turned the water upon them with another loud guffaw.
"If only his fancy would take him into the pantry," she thought, "I
could shut and lock the door upon him and hold him prisoner till Ned
gets back."
But his fancy ended its flight at the sink, and before her hopes had
fully subsided he was standing on the threshold of the sitting-room
door.
"It's pretty here," he exclaimed, allowing his eye to rove again over
every hiding-place within sight. "I wonder now--" He stopped. His
glance had fallen on the cupboard over her husband's desk.
"Well?" she asked, anxious to break the thread of his thought, which
was only too plainly mirrored in his eager countenance.
He started, dropped his eyes, and, turning, surveyed her with a
momentary fierceness. But, as she did not let her own glance quail,
but continued to meet his gaze with what she meant for an
ingratiating smile, he subdued this outward manifestation of passion,
and, chuckling to hide his embarrassment, began backing into the
entry, leering in evident enjoyment of the fears he caused.
However, once in the hall he hesitated for a long time; then slowly
made for the garment he had dropped on entering, and stooping, drew
from underneath its folds a wicked-looking stick. Giving a kick to
the coat, which sent it into a remote corner, he bestowed upon her
another smile, and still carrying the stick, went slowly and
reluctantly away into the kitchen.
"Oh, God Almighty, help me!" was her prayer.
There was nothing left for her now but to endure, so throwing herself
into a chair, she tried to calm the beating of her heart and summon
up courage for the struggle which she felt was before her. That he
had come to rob and only waited to take her off her guard she now
felt certain, and rapidly running over in her mind all the expedients
of self-defense, possible to one in her situation, she suddenly
remembered the pistol which Ned kept in his desk.
Oh, why had she not thought of it before! Why had she let herself
grow mad with terror when here, within reach of her hand, lay such a
means of self-defense? With a feeling of joy (she had always hated
pistols before and scolded Ned when he bought this one) she started
to her feet and slid her hand into the drawer. But it came back
empty. Ned had taken the weapon away with him.
For a moment, a surge of the bitterest feeling she had ever
experienced passed over her; then she called reason to her aid and
was obliged to acknowledge that the act was but natural, and that
from his standpoint he was much more likely to need it than herself.
But the disappointment, coming so soon after hope, unnerved her, and
she sank hack in her chair, giving herself up for lost.
How long she sat there with her eyes on the door through which she
momentarily expected her assailant to reappear, she never knew. She
was conscious only of a sort of apathy that made movement difficult
and even breathing a task. In vain she tried to change her thoughts.
In vain she tried to follow her husband in fancy over the
snow-covered roads and into the gorge of the mountains. Imagination
failed her at this point Do what she would, all was misty to her
mind's eye, and she could not see that wandering image. There was
blankness between his form and her, and no life or movement anywhere
but here in the scene of her terror.
Her eyes were on a strip of rug covering the entry floor, and so
strange was the condition of her mind that she found herself
mechanically counting the tassels finishing off its edge, growing
wroth over one that was worn, till she hated that sixth tassel and
mentally determined that if she ever outlived this night she would
strip them all off and be done with them.
The wind had lessened, but the air had grown cooler and the snow made
a sharp sound where it struck the panes. She felt it falling, though
she had cut off all view of it. It seemed to her that a pall was
settling over the world and that she would soon be smothered under
its folds.
Meanwhile no sound came from the kitchen. A dreadful sense of doom
was creeping upon her--a sense growing in intensity till she found
herself watching for the shadow of that lifted stick on the wall of
the entry and almost imagined she saw the tip of it appearing.
But it was the door which again blew in, admitting another man of so
threatening an aspect that she succumbed instantly before him and
forgot all her former fears in this new terror.
The second intruder was a negro of powerful frame and lowering
aspect, and as he came forward and stood in the doorway there was
observable in his fierce and desperate countenance no attempt at the
insinuation of the other, only a fearful resolution that made her
feel like a puppet before him, and drove her, almost without her
volition, to her knees.
"Money? Is it money you want?" was her desperate greeting. "If so,
here's my purse and here are my rings and watch. Take them and go."
But the stolid wretch did not even stretch out his hands. His eyes
went beyond her, and the mingled anxiety and resolve which he
displayed would have cowed a stouter heart than that of this poor
woman.
"Keep de trash," he growled. "I want de company's money. You've got
it--two thousand dollars. Show me where it is, that's all, and I
won't trouble you long after I close on it."
"But it's not in the house," she cried. "I swear it is not in the
house. Do you think Mr. Chivers would leave me here alone with two
thousand dollars to guard?"
But the negro, swearing that she lied, leaped into the room, and
tearing open the cupboard above her husband's desk, seized the bag
from the corner where they had put it.
"Hie brought it in this," he muttered, and tried to force the bag
open, but finding this impossible he took out a heavy knife and cut a
big hole in its side. Instantly there fell out the pile of old
receipts with which they had stuffed it, and seeing these he stamped
with rage, and flinging them at her in one great handful, rushed to
the drawers below, emptied them, and, finding nothing, attacked the
bookcase.
"The money is somewhere here. You can't fool me," he yelled. "I saw
the spot your eyes lit on when I first came into the room. Is it
behind these books?" he growled, pulling them out and throwing them
helter-skelter over the floor. "Women is smart in the hiding
business. Is it behind these books, I say?"
They had been, or rather had been placed between the books, but she
had taken them away, as we know, and he soon began to realize that
his search was bringing him nothing. Leaving the bookcase he gave
the books one kick, and seizing her by the arm, shook her with a
murderous glare on his strange and distorted features.
"Where's the money?" he hissed. "Tell me, or you are a goner."
He raised his heavy fist. She crouched and all over, when, with a
rush and cry, a figure dashed between them and he fell, struck down
by the very stick she had so long been expecting to see fall upon her
own head. The man who had been her terror for hours had at the
moment of need acted as her protector.
* * * * * * * *
She must have fainted, but if so, her unconsciousness was but
momentary, for when she woke again to her surroundings she found the
tramp still standing over her adversary.
"I hope you don't mind, ma'am," he said, with an air of humbleness
she certainly had not seen in him before, "but I think the man's
dead." And he stirred with his foot the heavy figure before him.
"Oh, no, no, no!" she cried. "That would be too fearful. He's
shocked, stunned; you cannot have killed him."
But the tramp was persistent. "I'm 'fraid I have," he said. "I done
it before. I'm powerful strong in the biceps. But I couldn't see a
man of that color frighten a lady like you. My supper was too warm
in me, ma'am. Shall I throw him outside the house?"
"Yes," she said, and then, "No; let us first be sure there is no life
in him." And, hardly knowing what she did, she stooped down and
peered into the glassy eyes of the prostrate man.
Suddenly she turned pale--no, not pale, but ghastly, and cowering
back, shook so that the tramp, into whose features a certain
refinement had passed since he had acted as her protector, thought
she had discovered life in those set orbs, and was stooping down to
make sure that this was so, when he saw her suddenly lean forward
and, impetuously plunging her hand into the negro's throat, tear open
the shirt and give one look at his bared breast.
It was white.
"O God! O God!" she moaned, and lifting the head in her two hands
she gave the motionless features a long and searching look. "Water!"
she cried. "Bring water." But before the now obedient tramp could
respond, she had torn off the woolly wig disfiguring the dead man's
head, and seeing the blond curls beneath had uttered such a shriek
that it rose above the gale and was heard by her distant neighbors.
It was the head and hair of her husband.
* * * * * * * *
They found out afterwards that he had contemplated this theft for
months; that each and every precaution necessary to the success of
this most daring undertaking had been made use of and that but for
the unexpected presence in the house of the tramp, he would doubtless
not only have extorted the money from his wife, but have so covered
up the deed by a plausible alibi as to have retained her confidence
and that of his employers.
Whether the tramp killed him out of sympathy for the defenseless
woman or in rage at being disappointed in his own plans has never
been determined. Mrs. Chivers herself thinks he was actuated by a
rude sort of gratitude.
The Little Steel Coils
BY ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
I
"A lady to see you, sir."
I looked up and was at once impressed by the grace and beauty of the
person thus introduced to me.
"Is there anything I can do to serve you?" I asked, rising.
She cast me a childlike look full of trust and candor as she seated
herself in the chair I had pointed out.
"I believe so; I hope so," she earnestly assured me. "I--I am in
great trouble. I have just lost my husband--but it is not that. It
is the slip of paper I found on my dresser, and which--which--"
She was trembling violently and her words were fast becoming
incoherent. I calmed her and asked her to relate her story just as
it had happened; and after a few minutes of silent struggle she
succeeded in collecting herself sufficiently to respond with some
degree of connection and self-possession.
"I have been married six months. My name is Lucy Holmes. For the
last few weeks my husband and I have been living in an apartment
house on Fifty-ninth Street, and, as we had not a care in the world,
we were very happy till Mr. Holmes was called away on business to
Philadelphia. This was two weeks ago. Five days later I received an
affectionate letter from him, in which he promised to come back the
next day; and the news so delighted me that I accepted an invitation
to the theatre from some intimate friends of ours. The next morning
I naturally felt fatigued and rose late; but I was very cheerful, for
I expected my husband at noon. And now comes the perplexing mystery.
In the course of I dressing myself I stepped to my bureau, and seeing
a small newspaper slip attached to the cushion by a pin, I drew it
off and read it. It was a death notice, and my hair rose and my
limbs failed me as I took in its fatal and incredible words.
"'Died this day at the Colonnade, James Forsythe De Witt Holmes. New
York papers, please copy.'
"James Forsythe De Witt Holmes was my husband, and his last letter,
which was at that very moment lying beside the cushion, had been
dated from the Colonnade. Was I dreaming or under the spell of some
frightful hallucination which led me to misread the name on the slip
of paper before me? I could not determine. My head, throat, and
chest seemed bound about with iron, so that I could neither speak nor
breathe with freedom, and, suffering thus, I stood staring at this
demoniacal bit of paper which in an instant had brought the shadow of
death upon my happy life. Nor was I at all relieved when a little
later I flew with the notice into a neighbor's apartment, and praying
her to read it to me, found that my eyes had not deceived me and that
the name was indeed my husband's and the notice one of death.
"Not from my own mind but from hers came the first suggestion of
comfort.
"'It cannot be your husband who is meant,' said she; 'but some one of
the same name. Your husband wrote to you yesterday, and this person
must have been dead at least two days for the printed notice of his
decease to have reached New York. Some one has remarked the striking
similarity of names, and wishing to startle you, cut the slip out and
pinned it on your cushion.'
"I certainly knew of no one inconsiderate enough to do this, but the
explanation was so plausible, I at once embraced it and sobbed aloud
in my relief. But in the midst of my rejoicing I heard the bell ring
in my apartment, and, running thither, encountered a telegraph boy
holding in his outstretched hand the yellow envelope which so often
bespeaks death or disaster. The sight took my breath away.
Summoning my maid, whom I saw hastening toward me from an inner room,
I begged her to open the telegram for me. Sir, I saw in her face,
before she had read the first line, a confirmation of my very worst
fears. My husband was--"
The young widow, choked with her emotions, paused, recovered herself
for the second time, and then went on.
"I had better show you the telegram."
Taking it from her pocketbook, she held it toward me. I read it at a
glance. It was short, simple, and direct:
"Come at once. Your husband found dead in his room this morning.
Doctors say heart disease. Please telegraph."
"You see it says this morning," she explained, placing her delicate
finger on the word she so eagerly quoted. "That means a week ago
Wednesday, the same day on which the printed slip recording his death
was found on my cushion. Do you not see something very strange in
this?"
I did; but, before I ventured to express myself on this subject, I
desired her to tell me what she had learned in her visit to
Philadelphia.
Her answer was simple and straightforward.
"But little more than you find in this telegram. He died in his
room. He was found lying on the floor near the bell-button, which he
had evidently risen to touch. One hand was clenched on his chest,
but his face wore a peaceful look, as if death had come too suddenly
to cause him much suffering. His bed was undisturbed; he had died
before retiring, possibly in the act of packing his trunk, for it was
found nearly ready for the expressman. Indeed, there was every
evidence of his intention to leave on an early morning train. He had
even desired to be awakened at six o'clock; and it was his failure to
respond to the summons of the bellboy which led to so early a
discovery of his death. He had never complained of any distress in
breathing, and we had always considered him a perfectly healthy man;
but there was no reason for assigning any other cause than heart
failure to his sudden death, and so the burial certificate was made
out to that effect, and I was allowed to bring him home and bury him
in our vault at Woodlawn. But"--and here her earnestness dried up
the tears which had been flowing freely during this recital of her
husband's lonely death and sad burial--"do you not think an
investigation should be made into a death preceded by a false
obituary notice? For I found when I was in Philadelphia that no
paragraph such as I had found pinned to my cushion had been inserted
in any paper there, nor had any other man of the same name ever
registered at the Colonnade, much less died there."
"Have you this notice with you?" I asked.
She immediately produced it, and while I was glancing it over
remarked:
"Some persons would give a superstitious explanation to the whole
matter; think I had received a supernatural warning and been
satisfied with what they would call a spiritual manifestation. But I
have not a bit of such folly in my composition. Living hands set up
the type and printed the words which gave me so deathly a shock; and
hands, with a real purpose in them, cut it from the paper and pinned
it to my cushion for me to see when I woke on that fatal morning.
But whose hands? That is what I want you to discover."
I had caught the fever of her suspicions long before this and now
felt justified in showing my interest.
"First, let me ask," said I, "who has access to your rooms besides
your maid?"
"No one; absolutely no one."
"And what of her?"
"She is innocence herself. She is no common housemaid, but a girl my
mother brought up, who for love of me consents to do such work in the
household as my simple needs require."
"I should like to see her."
"There is no objection to your doing so; but you will gain nothing by
it. I have already talked the subject over with her a dozen times
and she is as much puzzled by it as I am myself. She says she cannot
see how any one could have found an entrance to my room during my
sleep, as the doors were all locked. Yet, as she very naturally
observes, some one must have done so, for she was in my bedroom
herself just before I returned from the theatre, and can swear, if
necessary, that no such slip of paper was to be seen on my cushion at
that time, for her duties led her directly to my bureau and kept her
there for full five minutes."
"And you believed her?" I suggested.
"Implicitly."
"In what direction, then, do your suspicions turn?"
"Alas! in no direction. That is the trouble. I don't know whom to
mistrust. It was because I was told that you had the credit of
seeing light where others can see nothing but darkness that I have
sought your aid in this emergency. For the uncertainty surrounding
this matter is killing me and will make my sorrow quite unendurable
if I cannot obtain relief from it."
"I do not wonder," I began, struck by the note of truth in her tones.
"And I shall certainly do what I can for you. But before we go any
further, let us examine this scrap of newspaper and see what we can
make out of it."
I had already noted two or three points in connection with it to
which I now proceeded to direct her attention.
"Have you compared this notice," I pursued, "with such others as you
find every day in the papers?"
"No," was her eager answer. "Is it not like them all--"
"Read," was my quiet interruption. "'On this day at the
Colonnade'--on what day? The date is usually given in all the bona
fide notices I have seen."
"Is it?" she asked, her eyes, moist with unshed tears, opening widely
in her astonishment.
"Look in the papers on your return home and see. Then the print.
Observe that the type is identical on both sides of this make-believe
clipping, while in fact there is always a perceptible difference
between that used in the obituary column and that to be found in the
columns devoted to other matter. Notice also," I continued, holding
up the scrap of paper between her and the light, "that the alignment
on one side is not exactly parallel with that on the other; a
discrepancy which would not exist if both sides had been printed on a
newspaper press. These facts lead me to conclude, first, that the
effort to match the type exactly was the mistake of a man who tried
to do too much; and, secondly, that one of the sides at least,
presumably that containing the obituary notice, was printed on a
hand-press, on the blank side of a piece of galley proof picked up in
some newspaper office."
"Let me see." And stretching out her hand with the utmost eagerness,
she took the slip and turned it over. Instantly a change took place
in her countenance. She sank back in her seat and a blush of
manifest confusion suffused her cheeks. "Oh!" she exclaimed; "what
will you think of me! I brought this scrap of print into the house
_myself_, and it was _I_ who pinned it on the cushion with my own
hands! I remember it now. The sight of those words recalls the
whole occurrence."
"Then there is one mystery less for us to solve," I remarked,
somewhat dryly.
"Do you think so?" she protested, with a deprecatory look. "For me
the mystery deepens, and becomes every minute more serious. It is
true that I brought this scrap of newspaper into the house, and that
it had, then as now, the notice of my husband's death upon it, but
the time of my bringing it in was Tuesday night, and he was not found
dead till Wednesday morning."
"A discrepancy worth noting," I remarked.
"Involving a mystery of some importance," she concluded.
I agreed to that.
"And since we have discovered how the slip came into your room, we
can now proceed to the clearing up of this mystery," I observed.
"You can, of course, inform me where you procured this clipping which
you say you brought into the house?"
"Yes. You may think it strange, but when I alighted from the
carriage that night, a man on the sidewalk put this tiny scrap of
paper into my hand. It was done so mechanically that it made no more
impression on my mind than the thrusting of an advertisement upon me.
Indeed, I supposed it was an advertisement, and I only wonder that I
retained it in my hand at all. But that I did do so, and that, in a
moment of abstraction, I went so far as to pin it to my cushion, is
evident from the fact that a vague memory remains in my mind of
having read this recipe which you see printed on the reverse side of
the paper."
"It was the recipe, then, and not the obituary notice which attracted
your attention the night before?"
"Probably, but in pinning it to the cushion, it was the obituary
notice that chanced to come uppermost. Oh, why should I not have
remembered this till now! Can you understand my forgetting a matter
of so much importance?"
"Yes," I allowed, after a momentary consideration of her ingenuous
countenance. "The words you read in the morning were so startling
that they disconnected themselves from those you had carelessly
glanced at the night before."
"That is it," she replied; "and since then I have had eyes for the
one side only. How could I think of the other? But who could have
printed this thing and who was the man who put it into my hand? He
looked like a beggar, but-- Oh!" she suddenly exclaimed, her cheeks
flushing scarlet and her eyes flashing with a feverish, almost
alarming glitter.
"What is it now?" I asked. "Another recollection?"
"Yes." She spoke so low I could hardly hear her. "He coughed and--"
"And what" I encouragingly suggested, seeing that she was under some
new and overwhelming emotion.
"That cough had a familiar sound, now that I think of it. It was
like that of a friend who-- But no, no; I will not wrong him by any
false surmises. He would stoop to much, but not to that; yet--"
The flush on her cheeks had died away, but the two vivid spots which
remained showed the depth of her excitement.
"Do you think," she suddenly asked, "that a man out of revenge might
plan to frighten me by a false notice of my husband's death, and that
God to punish him, made the notice a prophecy?"
"I think a man influenced by the spirit of revenge might do almost
anything," I answered, purposely ignoring the latter part of her
question.
"But I always considered him a good man. At least I never looked
upon him as a wicked one. Every other beggar we meet has a cough;
and yet," she added after a moment's pause, "if it was not he who
gave me this mortal shock, who was it? He is the only person in the
world I ever wronged."
"Had you not better tell me his name?" I suggested.
"No, I am in too great doubt. I should hate to do him a second
injury."
"You cannot injure him if he is innocent. My methods are very safe."
"If I could forget his cough! but it had that peculiar catch in it
that I remembered so well in the cough of John Graham. I did not pay
any especial heed to it at the time. Old days and old troubles were
far enough from my thoughts; but now that my suspicions are raised,
that low, choking sound comes back to me in a strangely persistent
way, and I seem to see a well-remembered form in the stooping figure
of this beggar. Oh, I hope the good God will forgive me if I
attribute to this disappointed man a wickedness he never committed."
"Who is John Graham?" I urged, "and what was the nature of the wrong
you did him?"
She rose, cast me one appealing glance, and perceiving that I meant
to have her whole story, turned toward the fire and stood warming her
feet before the hearth, with her face turned away from my gaze.
"I was once engaged to marry him," she began. "Not because I loved
him, but because we were very poor--I mean my mother and myself--and
he had a home and seemed both good and generous. The day came when
we were to be married--this was in the West, way out in Kansas--and I
was even dressed for the wedding, when a letter came from my uncle
here, a rich uncle, very rich, who had never had anything to do with
my mother since her marriage, and in it he promised me fortune and
everything else desirable in life if I would come to him,
unencumbered by any foolish ties. Think of it! And I within half an
hour of marriage with a man I had never loved and now suddenly hated.
The temptation was overwhelming, and, heartless as my conduct may
appear to you, I succumbed to it. Telling my lover that I had
changed my mind, I dismissed the minister when he came, and announced
my intention of proceeding East as soon as possible. Mr. Graham was
simply paralyzed by his disappointment, and during the few days which
intervened before my departure, I was haunted by his face, which was
like that of a man who had died from some overwhelming shock. But
when I was once free of the town, especially after I arrived in New
York, I forgot alike his misery and himself. Everything I saw was so
beautiful! Life was so full of charm, and my uncle so delighted with
me and everything I did! Then there was James Holmes, and after I
had seen him--But I cannot talk of that. We loved each other, and
under the surprise of this new delight how could I be expected to
remember the man I had left behind me in that barren region in which
I had spent my youth? But he did not forget the misery I had caused
him. He followed me to New York; and on the morning I was married
found his way into the house, and mixing with the wedding guests,
suddenly appeared before me just as I was receiving the
congratulations of my friends. At sight of him I experienced all the
terror he had calculated upon causing, but remembering our old
relations and my new position, I assumed an air of apparent
haughtiness. This irritated John Graham. Flushing with anger, and
ignoring my imploring look, he cried peremptorily, 'Present me to
your husband!' and I felt forced to present him. But his name
produced no effect upon Mr. Holmes. I had never told him of my early
experience with this man, and John Graham, perceiving this, cast me a
bitter glance of disdain and passed on, muttering between his teeth,
'False to me and false to him! Your punishment be upon you!' and I
felt as if I had been cursed."
She stopped here, moved by emotions readily to be understood. Then
with quick impetuosity she caught up the thread of her story and went
on.
"That was six months ago; and again I forgot. My mother died and my
husband soon absorbed my every thought. How could I dream that this
man, who was little more than a memory to me and scarcely that, was
secretly planning mischief against me? Yet this scrap about which we
have talked so much may have been the work of his hands; and even my
husband's death--"
She did not finish, but her face, which was turned toward me, spoke
volumes.
"Your husband's death shall be inquired into," I assured her.
And she, exhausted by the excitement of her discoveries, asked that
she might be excused from further discussion of the subject at that
time.
As I had no wish, myself, to enter any more fully into the matter
just then, I readily acceded to her request, and the pretty widow
left me.
II
Obviously the first fact to be settled was whether Mr. Holmes had
died from purely natural causes. I accordingly busied myself the
next few days with the question, and was fortunate enough to so
interest the proper authorities that an order was issued for the
exhumation and examination of the body.
The result was disappointing. No traces of poison were to be found
in the stomach nor was there to be seen on the body any mark of
violence with the exception of a minute prick upon one of his thumbs.
This speck was so small that it escaped every eye but my own.
The authorities assuring the widow that the doctor's certificate
given her in Philadelphia was correct, the body was again interred.
But I was not satisfied; and confident that this death had not been a
natural one, I entered upon one of those secret and prolonged
investigations which for so many years have constituted the pleasure
of my life. First, I visited the Colonnade in Philadelphia, and
being allowed to see the room in which Mr. Holmes died, went through
it carefully. As it had not been used since that time I had some
hopes of coming upon a clue.
But it was a vain hope, and the only result of my journey to this
place was the assurance I received that the gentleman had spent the
entire evening preceding his death in his own room, where he had been
brought several letters and one small package, the latter coming by
mail. With this one point gained--if it was a point--I went back to
New York.
Calling on Mrs. Holmes, I asked her if, while her husband was away,
she had sent him anything besides letters, and upon her replying to
the contrary, requested to know if in her visit to Philadelphia she
had noted among her husband's effects anything that was new or
unfamiliar to her. "For he received a package while there," I
explained, "and though its contents may have been perfectly harmless,
it is just as well for us to be assured of this before going any
further."
"Oh, you think, then, he was really the victim of some secret
violence."
"We have no proof of it," I said. "On the contrary, we are assured
that he died from natural causes. But the incident of the newspaper
slip outweighs, in my mind, the doctor's conclusions, and until the
mystery surrounding that obituary notice has been satisfactorily
explained by its author I shall hold to the theory that your husband
has been made away with in some strange and seemingly unaccountable
manner, which it is our duty to bring to light."
"You are right! You are right! Oh, John Graham!"
She was so carried away by this plain expression of my belief that
she forgot the question I had put to her.
"You have not said whether or not you found anything among your
husband's effects that can explain this mystery," I suggested.
She at once became attentive.
"Nothing," said she; "his trunks were already packed and his bag
nearly so. There were a few things lying about the room which I saw
thrust into the latter. Would you like to look through them? I have
not had the heart to open the bag since I came back."
As this was exactly what I wished, I said as much, and she led me
into a small room, against the wall of which stood a trunk with a
traveling-bag on top of it. Opening the latter, she spread the
contents out on the trunk.
"I know all these things," she sadly murmured, the tears welling in
her eyes.
"This?" I inquired, lifting up a bit of coiled wire with two or three
rings dangling from it.
"No; why, what is that?"
"It looks like a puzzle of some kind."
"Then it is of no consequence. My husband was forever amusing
himself over some such contrivance. All his friends knew how well he
liked these toys and frequently sent them to him. This one evidently
reached him from Philadelphia."
Meanwhile I was eying the bit of wire curiously. It was undoubtedly
a puzzle, but it had appendages to it that I did not understand.
"It is more than ordinarily complicated," I observed, moving the
rings up and down in a vain endeavor to work them off.
"The better he would like it," she said.
I kept working with the rings. Suddenly I gave a painful start. A
little prong in the handle of the toy had started out and pierced me.
"You had better not handle it," said I, and laid it down. But the
next moment I took it up again and put it in my pocket. The prick
made by this treacherous bit of mechanism was in or near the same
place on my thumb as the one I had noticed on the hand of the
deceased Mr. Holmes.
There was a fire in the room, and before proceeding further I
cauterized that prick with the end of a red-hot poker. Then I made
my adieux to Mrs. Holmes and went immediately to a chemist friend of
mine.
"Test the end of this bit of steel for me," said I. "I have reason
to believe it carries with it a deadly poison."
He took the toy, promising to subject it to every test possible and
let me know the result. Then I went home. I felt ill, or imagined I
did, which under the circumstances was almost as bad.
Next day, however, I was quite well, with the exception of a certain
inconvenience in my thumb. But not till the following week did I
receive the chemist's report. It overthrew my whole theory. He
found nothing, and returned me the bit of steel.
But I was not convinced.
"I will hunt up this John Graham," thought I, "and study him."
But this was not so easy a task as it may appear. As Mrs. Holmes
possessed no clue to the whereabouts of her quondam lover, I had
nothing to aid me in my search for him, save her rather vague
description of his personal appearance and the fact that he was
constantly interrupted in speaking by a low, choking cough. However,
my natural perseverance carried me through. After seeing and
interviewing a dozen John Grahams without result, I at last lit upon
a man of that name who presented a figure of such vivid unrest and
showed such a desperate hatred of his fellows, that I began to
entertain hopes of his being the person I was in search of. But
determined to be sure of this before proceeding further, I confided
my suspicions to Mrs. Holmes, and induced her to accompany me down to
a certain spot on the "Elevated" from which I had more than once seen
this man go by to his usual lounging place in Printing House Square.
She showed great courage in doing this, for she had such a dread of
him that she was in a state of nervous excitement from the moment she
left her house, feeling sure that she would attract his attention and
thus risk a disagreeable encounter. But she might have spared
herself these fears. He did not even glance up in passing us, and it
was mainly by his walk she recognized him. But she did recognize
him; and this nerved me at once to set about the formidable task of
fixing upon him a crime which was not even admitted as a fact by the
authorities.
He was a man-about-town, living, to all appearances, by his wits. He
was to be seen mostly in the downtown portions of the city, standing
for hours in front of some newspaper office, gnawing at his
finger-ends, and staring at the passers-by with a hungry look
alarming to the timid and provoking alms from the benevolent.
Needless to say that he rejected the latter expression of sympathy
with angry contempt.
His face was long and pallid, his cheek-bones high, and mouth bitter
and resolute in expression. He wore neither heard nor mustache, but
made up for their lack by an abundance of light-brown hair, which
hung very nearly to his shoulders. He stooped in standing, but as
soon, as he moved, showed decision and a certain sort of pride which
caused him to hold his head high and his body more than usually
erect. With all these good points his appearance was decidedly
sinister, and I did not wonder that Mrs. Holmes feared him.
My next move was to accost him. Pausing before the doorway in which
he stood, I addressed him some trivial question. He answered me with
sufficient politeness, but with a grudging attention which betrayed
the hold which his own thoughts had upon him. He coughed while
speaking, and his eye, which for a moment rested on mine, produced an
impression upon me for which I was hardly prepared, great as was my
prejudice against him. There was such an icy composure in it; the
composure of an envenomed nature conscious of its superiority to all
surprises. As I lingered to study him more closely, the many
dangerous qualities of the man became more and more apparent to me;
and convinced that to proceed further without deep and careful
thought would be to court failure where triumph would set me up for
life, I gave up all present attempt at enlisting him in conversation
and went away in an inquiring and serious mood.
In fact, my position was a peculiar one, and the problem I had set
for myself one of unusual difficulty. Only by means of some
extraordinary device such as is seldom resorted to by the police of
this or any other nation, could I hope to arrive at the secret of
this man's conduct, and triumph in a matter which to all appearance
was beyond human penetration.
But what device? I knew of none, nor through two days and nights of
strenuous thought did I receive the least light on, the subject.
Indeed, my mind seemed to grow more and more confused the more I
urged it into action. I failed to get inspiration indoors or out;
and feeling my health suffer from the constant irritation of my
recurring disappointment, I resolved to take a day off and carry
myself and my perplexities into the country.
I did so. Governed by an impulse which I did not then understand, I
went to a small town in New Jersey and entered the first house on
which I saw the sign "Room to Let." The result was most fortunate.
No sooner had I crossed the threshold of the neat and homely
apartment thrown open to my use, than it recalled a room in which I
had slept two years before and in which I had read a little book I
was only too glad to remember at this moment. Indeed, it seemed as
if a veritable inspiration had come to me through this recollection,
for though the tale to which I allude was a simple child's story
written for moral purposes, it contained an idea which promised to be
invaluable to me at this juncture. Indeed, by means of it, I
believed myself to have solved the problem that was puzzling me, and,
relieved beyond expression, I paid for the night's lodging I had now
determined to forego, and returned immediately to New York, having
spent just fifteen minutes in the town where I had received this
happy inspiration.
My first step on entering the city was to order a dozen steel coils
made similar to the one which I still believed answerable for James
Holmes's death. My next to learn as far as possible all of John
Graham's haunts and habits. At a week's end I had the springs and
knew almost as well as he did himself where he was likely to be found
at all times of the day and night. I immediately acted upon this
knowledge. Assuming a slight disguise, I repeated my former stroll
through Printing House Square, looking into each doorway as I passed.
John Graham was in one of them, staring in his old way at the passing
crowd, but evidently seeing nothing but the images formed by his own
disordered brain. A manuscript roll stuck out of his breast-pocket,
and from the way his nervous fingers fumbled with it, I began to
understand the restless glitter of his eyes, which were as full of
wretchedness as any eyes I have ever seen.
Entering the doorway where he stood, I dropped at his feet one of the
small steel coils with which I was provided. He did not see it.
Stopping near him, I directed his attention to it by saying:
"Pardon me, but did I not see something drop out of your hand?"
He started, glanced at the seemingly inoffensive toy I had pointed
out, and altered so suddenly and so vividly that it became instantly
apparent that the surprise I had planned for him was fully as keen
and searching a one as I had anticipated. Recoiling sharply, he gave
me a quick look, then glanced down again at his feet as if half
expecting to find the object of his terror gone. But, perceiving it
still lying there, he crushed it viciously with his heel, and
uttering some incoherent words dashed impetuously from the building.
Confident that he would regret this hasty impulse and return, I
withdrew a few steps and waited. And sure enough, in less than five
minutes he came slinking back. Picking up the coil with more than
one sly look about, he examined it closely. Suddenly he gave a sharp
cry and went staggering out. Had he discovered that the seeming
puzzle possessed the same invisible spring which had made the one
handled by James Holmes so dangerous?
Certain as to the place he would be found next, I made a short cut to
an obscure little saloon in Nassau Street, where I took up my stand
in a spot convenient for seeing without being seen. In ten minutes
he was standing at the bar asking for a drink.
"Whisky!" he cried. "Straight."
It was given him, but as he set the empty glass down on the counter
he saw lying before him another of the steel springs, and was so
confounded by the sight that the proprietor, who had put it there at
my instigation, thrust out his hand toward him as if half afraid he
would fall.
"Where did that--that thing come from?" stammered John Graham,
ignoring the other's gesture and pointing with a trembling hand at
the insignificant bit of wire between them.
"Didn't it drop from your coat-pocket?" inquired the proprietor. "It
wasn't lying here before you came in."
With a horrible oath the unhappy man turned and fled from the place.
I lost sight of him after that for three hours, then I suddenly came
upon him again. He was walking uptown with a set purpose in his face
that made him look more dangerous than ever. Of course I followed
him, expecting him to turn towards Fifty-ninth Street, but at the
corner of Madison Avenue and Forty-seventh Street he changed his mind
and dashed toward Third Avenue. At Park Avenue he faltered and again
turned north, walking for several blocks as if the fiends were behind
him. I began to think that he was but attempting to walk off his
excitement, when, at a sudden rushing sound in the cut beside us, he
stopped and trembled. An express train was shooting by. As it
disappeared in the tunnel beyond, he looked about him with a blanched
face and wandering eye: but his glance did not turn my way, or, if it
did, he failed to attach any meaning to my near presence.
He began to move on again and this time toward the bridge spanning
the cut. I followed him very closely. In the center of it he paused
and looked down at the track beneath him. Another train was
approaching. As it came near he trembled from head to foot, and,
catching at the railing against which he leaned, was about to make a
quick move forward when a puff of smoke arose from below and sent him
staggering backward, gasping with a terror I could hardly understand
till I saw that the smoke had taken the form of a spiral and was
sailing away before him in what to his disordered imagination must
have looked like a gigantic image of the coil with which twice before
on this day he had found himself confronted.
It may have been chance and it may have been providence; but
whichever it was it saved him. He could not face that semblance of
his haunting thought; and turning away he cowered down on the
neighboring curbstone, where he sat for several minutes, with his
head buried in his hands; when he arose again he was his own daring
and sinister self. Knowing that he was now too much master of his
faculties to ignore me any longer, I walked quickly away and left
him. I knew where he would be at six o'clock and had already engaged
a table at the same restaurant. It was seven, however, before he put
in an appearance, and by this time he was looking more composed.
There was a reckless air about him, however, which was perhaps only
noticeable to me; for none of the habitués of this especial
restaurant were entirely without it; wild eyes and unkempt hair being
in the majority.
I let him eat. The dinner he ordered was simple and I had not the
heart to interrupt his enjoyment of it.
But when he had finished and came to pay, then I allowed the shock to
come. Under the bill which the waiter laid at the side of his plate
was the inevitable steel coil; and it produced even more than its
usual effect. I own I felt sorry for him.
He did not dash from the place, however, as he had from the liquor
saloon. A spirit of resistance had seized him and he demanded to
know where this object of his fear had come from. No one could tell
him (or would). Whereupon he began to rave and would certainly have
done himself or somebody else an injury if he had not been calmed by
a man almost as wild-looking as himself. Paying his bill, but vowing
he would never enter the place again, he went out, clay white, but
with the swaggering air of a man who had just asserted himself.
He drooped, however, as soon as he reached the street, and I had no
difficulty in following him to a certain gambling den, where he
gained three dollars and lost five. From there he went to his
lodgings in West Tenth Street.
I did not follow him. He had passed through many deep and wearing
emotions since noon, and I had not the heart to add another to them.
But late the next day I returned to this house and rang the bell. It
was already dusk, but there was light enough for me to notice the
unrepaired condition of the iron railings on either side of the old
stoop and to compare this abode of decayed grandeur with the spacious
and elegant apartment in which pretty Mrs. Holmes mourned the loss of
her young husband. Had any such comparison ever been made by the
unhappy John Graham, as he hurried up these battered steps into the
dismal halls beyond?
In answer to my summons there came to the door a young woman to whom
I had but to intimate my wish to see Mr. Graham for her to let me in
with the short announcement:
"Top floor, back room! Door open, he's out; door shut, he's in."
As an open door meant liberty to enter, I lost no time in following
the direction of her finger, and presently found myself in a low
attic chamber overlooking an acre of roofs. A fire had been lighted
in the open grate, and the flickering red beams danced on ceiling and
walls with a cheeriness greatly in contrast to the nature of the
business which had led me there. As they also served to light the
room, I proceeded to make myself at home; and drawing up a chair, sat
down at the fireplace in such a way as to conceal myself from any one
entering the door.
In less than half an hour he came in.
He was in a state of high emotion. His face was flushed and his eyes
burning. Stepping rapidly forward, he flung his hat on the table in
the middle of the room, with a curse that was half cry and half
groan. Then he stood silent and I had an opportunity of noting how
haggard he had grown in the short time which had elapsed since I had
seen him last. But the interval of his inaction was short, and in a
moment he flung up his arms with a loud "Curse her!" that rang
through the narrow room and betrayed the source of his present
frenzy. Then he again stood still, grating his teeth and working his
hands in a way terribly suggestive of the murderer's instinct. But
not for long. He saw something that attracted his attention on the
table, a something upon which my eyes had long before been fixed, and
starting forward with a fresh and quite different display of emotion,
he caught up what looked like a roll of manuscript and began to tear
it open.
"Back again! Always back!" wailed from his lips; and he gave the
roll a toss that sent from its midst a small object which he no
sooner saw than he became speechless and reeled back. It was another
of the steel coils.
"Good God!" fell at last from his stiff and working lips. "Am I mad
or has the devil joined in the pursuit against me? I cannot eat, I
cannot drink, but this diabolical spring starts up before me. It is
here, there, everywhere. The visible sign of my guilt; the--the--"
He had stumbled back upon my chair, and turning, saw me.
I was on my feet at once, and noting that he was dazed by the shock
of my presence, I slid quietly between him and the door.
The movement roused him. Turning upon me with a sarcastic smile in
which was concentrated the bitterness of years, he briefly said:
"So I am caught! Well, there has to be an end to men as well as to
things, and I am ready for mine. She turned me away from her door
to-day, and after the hell of that moment I don't much fear any
other."
"You had better not talk," I admonished him. "All that falls from
you now will only tell against you on your trial."
He broke into a harsh laugh. "And do you think I care for that?
That having been driven by a woman's perfidy into crime I am going to
bridle my tongue and keep down the words which are my only safeguard
from insanity? No, no; while my miserable breath lasts I will curse
her, and if the halter is to cut short my words, it shall be with her
name blistering my lips."
I attempted to speak, but he would not give me an opportunity. The
passion of weeks had found vent and he rushed on recklessly:
"I went to her house to-day. I wanted to see her in her widow's
weeds; I wanted to see her eyes red with weeping over a grief which
owed its bitterness to me. But she would not grant me admittance.
She had me thrust from her door, and I shall never know how deeply
the iron has sunk into her soul. But"--and here his face showed a
sudden change--"I shall see her if I am tried for murder. She will
be in the court room--on the witness stand--"
"Doubtless," I interjected; but his interruption came quickly and
with vehement passion.
"Then I am ready. Welcome trial, conviction, death, even. To
confront her eye to eye is all I wish. She shall never forget it,
never!"
"Then you do not deny--" I began.
"I deny nothing," he returned, and held out his hands with a grim
gesture. "How can I, when there falls from everything I touch the
devilish thing which took away the life I hated?"
"Have you anything more to say or do before you leave these rooms?" I
asked.
He shook his head, and then, bethinking himself, pointed to the roll
of paper which he had flung on the table.
"Burn that!" he cried.
I took up the roll and looked at it. It was the manuscript of a poem
in blank verse.
"I have been with it into a dozen newspaper and magazine offices," he
explained with great bitterness. "Had I succeeded in getting a
publisher for it I might have forgotten my wrongs and tried to build
up a new life on the ruins of the old. But they would not have it,
none of them; so I say, burn it! that no memory of me may remain in
this miserable world."
"Keep to the facts!" I severely retorted. "It was while carrying
this poem from one newspaper to another that you secured that bit of
print upon the blank side of which yourself printed the obituary
notice with which you savored your revenge upon the woman who had
disappointed you."
"You know that? Then you know where I got the poison with which I
tipped the silly toy with which that weak man fooled away his life?"
"No," said I, "I do not know where you got it. I merely know it was
no common poison bought at a druggist's, or from any ordinary
chemist."
"It was woorali; the deadly, secret woorali. I got it from--but that
is another man's secret. You will never hear from me anything that
will compromise a friend. I got it, that is all. One drop, but it
killed my man."
The satisfaction, the delight, which he threw into these words are
beyond description. As they left his lips a jet of flame from the
neglected fire shot up and threw his figure for one instant into bold
relief upon the lowering ceiling; then it died out, and nothing but
the twilight dusk remained in the room and on the countenance of this
doomed and despairing man.
The Staircase at Heart's Delight
BY ANNA KATHARINE GREEN
In the spring of 18--, the attention of the New York police was
attracted by the many cases of well-known men found drowned in the
various waters surrounding the lower portion of our great city.
Among these may be mentioned the name of Elwood Henderson, the noted
tea merchant, whose remains were washed ashore at Redhook Point; and
of Christopher Bigelow, who was picked up off Governor's Island after
having been in the water for five days, and of another well-known
millionaire whose name I cannot now recall, but who, I remember, was
seen to walk toward the East River one March evening, and was not met
with again till the 5th of April, when his body floated into one of
the docks near Peck's Slip.
As it seemed highly improbable that there should have been a
concerted action among so many wealthy and distinguished men to end
their lives within a few weeks of each other, and all by the same
method of drowning, we soon became suspicious that a more serious
verdict than that of suicide should have been rendered in the case of
Henderson, Bigelow, and the other gentleman I have mentioned. Yet
one fact, common to all these cases, pointed so conclusively to
deliberate intention on the part of the sufferers that we hesitated
to take action.
This was, that upon the body of each of the above-mentioned persons
there were found, not only valuables in the shape of money and
jewelry, but papers and memoranda of a nature calculated to fix the
identity of the drowned man, in case the water should rob him of his
personal characteristics. Consequently, we could not ascribe these
deaths to a desire for plunder on the part of some unknown person.
I was a young man in those days, and full of ambition. So, though I
said nothing, I did not let this matter drop when the others did, but
kept my mind persistently upon it and waited, with odd results as you
will hear, for another victim to be reported at police headquarters.
Meantime I sought to discover some bond or connection between the
several men who had been found drowned, which would serve to explain
their similar fate. But all my efforts in this direction were
fruitless. There was no bond between them, and the matter remained
for a while an unsolved mystery.
Suddenly one morning a clue was placed, not in my hands, but in those
of a superior official who at that time exerted a great influence
over the whole force. He was sitting in his private room, when there
was ushered into his presence a young man of a dissipated, but not
unprepossessing appearance, who, after a pause of marked
embarrassment, entered upon the following story:
"I don't know whether or no I should offer an excuse for the
communication I am about to make; but the matter I have to relate is
simply this: Being hard up last night (for though a rich man's son I
often lack money), I went to a certain pawnshop in the Bowery where I
had been told I could raise money on my prospects. This place--you
may see it some time, so I will not enlarge upon it--did not strike
me favorably; but, being very anxious for a certain definite sum of
money, I wrote my name in a book which was brought to me from some
unknown quarter and proceeded to follow the young woman who attended
me into what she was pleased to call her good master's private office.
"He may have been a good master, but he was anything but a good man.
In short, sir, when he found out who I was, and how much I needed
money, he suggested that I should make an appointment with my father
at a place he called Groll's in Grand Street, where, said he, 'your
little affair will be arranged, and you made a rich man within thirty
days. That is,' he slyly added, 'unless your father has already made
a will, disinheriting you.'
"I was shocked, sir, shocked beyond all my powers of concealment, not
so much at his words, which I hardly understood, as at his looks,
which had a world of evil suggestion in them; so I raised my fist and
would have knocked him down, only that I found two young fellows at
my elbows, who held me quiet for five minutes, while the old fellow
talked to me. He asked me if I came to him on a fool's errand or
really to get money; and when I admitted that I had cherished hopes
of obtaining a clear two thousand dollars from him, he coolly replied
that he knew of but one way in which I could hope to get such an
amount, and that if I was too squeamish to adopt it, I had made a
mistake in coming to his shop, which was no missionary institution,
etc., etc.
"Not wishing to irritate him, for there was menace in his eye, I
asked, with a certain weak show of being sorry for my former heat,
whereabouts in Grand Street I should find this Groll.
"The retort was quick. 'Groll is not his name,' said he, 'and Grand
Street is not where you are to go to find him. I threw out a bait to
see if you would snap at it, but I find you timid, and therefore
advise you to drop the matter entirely.'
"I was quite willing to do so, and answered him to this effect;
whereupon, with a side glance I did not understand, but which made me
more or less uneasy in regard to his intentions toward me, he
motioned to the men who held my arms to let go their hold, which they
at once did.
"'We have your signature,' growled the old man as I went out. 'If
you peach on us or trouble us in any way we will show it to your
father and that will put an end to all your hopes of future fortune.'
Then raising his voice, he shouted to the girl in the outer office,
'Let the young man see what he has signed.'
"She smiled and again brought forward the book in which I had so
recklessly placed my name, and there at the top of the page I read
these words: 'For moneys received, I agree to notify Rube Goodman,
within the month, of the death of my father, so that he may recover
from me, without loss of time, the sum of ten thousand dollars as his
part of the amount I am bound to receive as my father's heir.'
"The sight of these lines knocked me hollow. But I am less of a
coward morally than physically, and I determined to acquaint my
father at once with what I had done, and get his advice as to whether
or not I should inform the police of my adventure. He heard me with
more consideration than I expected, but insisted that I should
immediately make known to you my experience in this Bowery
pawnbroker's shop."
The officer, highly interested, took down the young man's statement
in writing, and, after getting a more accurate description of the
house itself, allowed his visitor to go.
Fortunately for me, I was in the building at the time, and was able
to respond when a man was called up to investigate this matter.
Thinking that I saw a connection between it and the various
mysterious deaths of which I have previously spoken, I entered into
the affair with much spirit. But, wishing to be sure that my
possibly unwarranted conclusions were correct, I took pains to
inquire, before proceeding upon my errand, into the character of the
heirs who had inherited the property of Elwood Henderson and
Christopher Bigelow, and found that in each case there was one among
the rest who was well known for his profligacy and reckless
expenditure.
It was a significant discovery, and increased, if possible, my
interest in running down this nefarious trafficker in the lives of
wealthy men.
Knowing that I could hope for no success in my character of
detective, I made an arrangement with the father of the young
gentleman before alluded to, by which I was to enter the pawnshop as
an emissary of the latter. Accordingly, I appeared there, one dull
November afternoon, in the garb of a certain Western, sporting man,
who, for a consideration, allowed me the temporary use of his name
and credentials.
Entering beneath the three golden balls, with the swagger and general
air of ownership I thought most likely to impose upon the
self-satisfied female who presided over the desk, I asked to see her
boss.
"On your own business?" she queried, glancing with suspicion at my
short coat, which was rather more showy than elegant.
"No," I returned, "not on my own business, but on that of a young
gent--"
"Any one whose name is written here?" she interposed, reaching toward
me the famous book, over the top of which, however, she was careful
to lay her arm.
I glanced down the page she had opened and instantly detected that of
the young gentleman on whose behalf I was supposed to be there, and
nodded "Yes," with all the assurance of which I was capable.
"Come, then," said she, ushering me without more ado into a den of
discomfort where sat a man with a great beard and such heavy
overhanging eyebrows that I could hardly detect the twinkle of his
eyes, keen and incisive as they were.
Smiling upon him, but not in the same way I had upon the girl, I
glanced behind me at the open door, and above me at the partitions,
which failed to reach the ceiling. Then I shook my head and drew a
step nearer.
"I have come," I insinuatingly whispered, "on behalf of a certain
party who left this place in a huff a day or so ago, but who since
then has had time to think the matter over, and has sent me with an
apology which he hopes"--here I put on a diabolical smile, copied, I
declare to you, from the one I saw at that moment on his own
lips--"you will accept."
The old wretch regarded me for full two minutes in a way to unmask me
had I possessed less confidence in my disguise and in my ability to
support it.
"And what is this young gentleman's name?" he finally asked.
For reply, I handed him a slip of paper. He took it and read the few
lines written on it, after which he began to rub his palms softly
together with an unction eminently in keeping with the stray glints
of light that now and then found their way through his bushy eyebrows.
"And so the young gentleman had not the courage to come again
himself?" he softly suggested, with just the suspicion of an ironical
laugh. "Thought, perhaps, I would exact too much commission; or make
him pay too roundly for his impertinent assurance."
I shrugged my shoulders, but vouchsafed no immediate reply, and he
saw that he had to open the business himself. He did it warily and
with many an incisive question which would have tripped me up if I
had not been very much on my guard; but it all ended, as such matters
usually do, in mutual understanding, and a promise that if the young
gentleman was willing to sign a certain paper, which, by the way, was
not shown me, he would in exchange give him an address which, if made
proper use of, would lead to my patron finding himself an independent
man within a very few days.
As this address was the one thing I was most desirous of obtaining, I
professed myself satisfied with the arrangement, and proceeded to
hunt up my patron, as he was called. Informing him of the result of
my visit, I asked if his interest in ferreting out these criminals
was strong enough to lead him to sign the vile document which the
pawnbroker would probably have in readiness for him on the morrow;
and being told it was, we separated for that day, with the
understanding that we were to meet the next morning at the spot
chosen by the pawnbroker for the completion of his nefarious bargain.
Being certain that I was being followed in all my movements by the
agents of this adept in villainy, I took care, upon leaving Mr.
L----, to repair to the hotel of the sporting man I was personifying.
Making myself square with the proprietor I took up my quarters in the
room of my sporting friend, and the better to deceive any spy who
might be lurking about, I received his letters and sent out his
telegrams, which, if they did not create confusion in the affairs of
"The Plunger," must at least have occasioned him no little work the
next day.
Promptly at ten o'clock on the following morning I met my patron at
the appointed place of rendezvous; and when I tell you that this was
no other than the ancient and now disused cemetery of which a portion
is still to be seen off Chatham Square, you will understand the
uncanny nature of this whole adventure, and the lurking sense there
was in it of brooding death and horror. The scene, which in these
days is disturbed by elevated railroad trains and the flapping of
long lines of particolored clothes strung high up across the quiet
tombstones, was at that time one of peaceful rest, in the midst of a
quarter devoted to everything for which that rest is the fitting and
desirable end; and as we paused among the mossy stones, we found it
hard to realize that in a few minutes there would be standing beside
us the concentrated essence of all that was evil and despicable in
human nature.
He arrived with a smile on his countenance that completed his
ugliness, and would have frightened any honest man from his side at
once. Merely glancing my way, he shuffled up to my companion, and
leading him aside, drew out a paper which he laid on a flat tombstone
with a gesture significant of his desire that the other should affix
to it the required signature.
Meantime I stood guard, and while attempting to whistle a light air,
was carelessly taking in the surroundings, and conjecturing, as best
I might, the reasons which had induced the old ghoul to make use of
this spot for his diabolical business, and had about decided that it
was because he was a ghoul, and thus felt at home among the symbols
of mortality, when I caught sight of two or three young fellows who
were lounging on the other side of the fence.
These were so evidently accomplices that I wondered if the two sly
boys I had engaged to stand by me through this affair had spotted
them, and would know enough to follow them back to their haunts.
A few minutes later, the old rascal came sneaking toward me, with a
gleam of satisfaction in his half-closed eyes.
"You are not wanted any longer," he grunted. "The young gentleman
told me to say that he could look out for himself now."
"The young gentleman had better pay me the round fifty he promised
me," I grumbled in return, with that sudden change from indifference
to menace which I thought best calculated to further my plans; and
shouldering the miserable wretch aside, I stepped up to my companion,
who was still lingering in a state of hesitation among the
gravestones.
"Quick! Tell me the number and street which he has given you!" I
whispered, in a tone quite out of keeping with the angry and
reproachful air I had assumed.
He was about to answer, when the old fellow came sidling up behind
us. Instantly the young man before me rose to the occasion, and
putting on an air of conciliation, said in a soothing tone:
"There, there, don't bluster. Do one thing more for me, and I will
add another fifty to that I promised you. Conjure up an anonymous
letter:--you know how--and send it to my father, saying that if he
wants to know where his son loses his hundreds, he must go to the
place on the dock, opposite 5 South Street, some night shortly after
nine. It would not work with most men, but it will with my father,
and when he has been in and out of that place, and I succeed to the
fortune he will leave me, then I will remember you, and--"
"Say, too," a sinister voice here added in my ear, "that if he wishes
to effect an entrance into the gambling den which his son haunts, he
must take the precaution of tying a bit of blue ribbon in his
buttonhole. It is a signal meaning business, and must not be
forgotten," chuckled the old fellow, evidently deceived at last into
thinking I was really one of his own kind.
I answered by a wink, and taking care to attempt no further
communication with my patron, I left the two, as soon as possible,
and went back to the hotel, where I dropped "the sport," and assumed
a character and dress which enabled me to make my way undetected to
the house of my young patron, where for two days I lay low, waiting
for a suitable time in which to make my final attempt to penetrate
this mystery.
I knew that for the adventure I was now contemplating considerable
courage was required. But I did not hesitate. The time had come for
me to show my mettle. In the few communications I was enabled to
hold with my superiors I told them of my progress and arranged with
them my plan of work. As we all agreed that I was about to encounter
no common villainy, these plans naturally partook of finesse, as you
will see if you follow my narrative to the end.
Early in the evening of a cool November day I sallied forth into the
streets, dressed in the habiliments and wearing the guise of the
wealthy old gentleman whose secret guest I had been for the last few
days. As he was old and portly, and I young and spare, this disguise
had cost me no little thought and labor. But assisted as I was by
the darkness, I had but little fear of betraying myself to any chance
spy who might be upon the watch, especially as Mr. L---- had a
peculiar walk, which, in my short stay with him, I had learned to
imitate perfectly. In the lapel of my overcoat I had tied a tag of
blue ribbon, and, though for all I knew this was a signal devoting me
to a secret and mysterious death, I walked along in a buoyant
condition of mind, attributable, no doubt, to the excitement of the
venture and to my desire to test my powers, even at the risk of my
life.
It was nine o'clock when I reached South Street. It was no new
region to me, nor was I ignorant of the specified drinking den on the
dock to which I had been directed. I remembered it as a bright spot
in a mass of ship-prows and bow-rigging, and was possessed, besides,
of a vague consciousness that there was something odd in connection
with it which had aroused my curiosity sufficiently in the past for
me to have once formed the resolution of seeing it again under
circumstances which would allow me to give it some attention. But I
never thought that the circumstances would involve my own life,
impossible as it is for a detective to reckon upon the future or to
foresee the events into which he will be hurried by the next crime
which may be reported at police headquarters.
There were but few persons in the street when I crossed to The
Heart's Delight--so named from the heart-shaped opening in the
framework of the door, through which shone a light, inviting enough
to one chilled by the keen November air and oppressed by the desolate
appearance of the almost deserted street. But amongst those persons
I thought I recognized more than one familiar form, and felt
reassured as to the watch which had been set upon the house.
The night was dark and the river especially so, but in the gloomy
space beyond the dock I detected a shadow blacker than the rest,
which I took for the police boat they had promised to have in
readiness in case I needed rescue from the waterside. Otherwise the
surroundings were as usual, and saving the gruff singing of some
drunken sailor coming from a narrow side street near by, no sound
disturbed the somewhat lugubrious silence of this weird and forsaken
spot.
Pausing an instant before entering, I glanced up at the building,
which was about three stories high, and endeavored to see what there
was about it which had once arrested my attention, and came to the
conclusion that it was its exceptional situation on the dock, and the
ghostly effect of the hoisting-beam projecting from the upper story
like a gibbet. And yet this beam was common to many a warehouse in
the vicinity, though in none of them were there any such signs of
life as proceeded from the curious mixture of sail loft, boat shop,
and drinking saloon, now before me. Could it be that the ban of
criminality was upon the house, and that I had been conscious of this
without being able to realize the cause of my interest?
Not stopping to solve my sensations further, I tried the door, and,
finding it yield easily to my touch, turned the knob and entered.
For a moment I was blinded by the smoky glare of the heated
atmosphere into which I stepped, but presently I was able to
distinguish the vague outlines of an oyster bar in the distance, and
the motionless figures of some half-dozen men, whose movements had
been arrested by my sudden entrance. For an instant this picture
remained; then the drinking and card playing were resumed, and I
stood, as it were, alone, on the sanded floor near the door.
Improving the opportunity for a closer inspection of the place, I was
struck by its picturesqueness. It had evidently been once used as a
ship chandlery, and on the walls, which were but partly plastered,
there still hung old bits of marlin, rusty rings, and such other
evidences of former traffic as did not interfere with the present
more lucrative business.
Below were the two bars, one at the right of the door, and the other
at the lower end of the room near a window, through whose small,
square panes I caught a glimpse of the colored lights of a couple of
ferryboats, passing each other in midstream.
At a table near me sat two men, grumbling at each other over a game
of cards. They were large and powerful figures in the contracted
space of this long and narrow room and my heart gave a bound of joy
as I recognized on them certain marks by which I was to know friend
from foe in this possible den of thieves and murderers.
Two sailors at the bar were bona fide habitués of the place and so
were the two other waterside characters I could faintly discern in
one of the dim corners. Meantime a man was approaching me.
Let me see if I can describe him. He was about thirty, and had the
complexion and figure of a consumptive, but his eye shone with the
yellow glare of a beast of prey, and in the cadaverous hollows of his
ashen cheeks and amid the lines about his thin drawn lips there lay,
for all his conciliatory smile, an expression so cold and yet so
ferocious that I spotted him at once as the man to whose genius we
were indebted for the new scheme of murder which I was jeopardizing
my life to understand. But I allowed none of the repugnance with
which he inspired me to appear in my manner, and, greeting him with
half a nod, waited for him to speak. His voice had that smooth
quality which betrays the hypocrite.
"Has the gentleman any appointment here?" he asked, letting his
glance fall for the merest instant on the lapel of my coat.
I returned a decided affirmative. "Or rather," I went on, with a
meaning look he evidently comprehended, "my son has, and I have made
up my mind to know just what deviltry he is up to these days. I can
make it worth your while to give me the opportunity."
"Oh, I see," he assented with a glance at the pocketbook I had just
drawn out. "You want a private room from which you can watch the
young scapegrace. I understand, I understand. But the private rooms
are above. Gentlemen are not comfortable here."
"I should say not," I murmured, and drew from the pocketbook a bill
which I slid quietly into his hand. "Now take me where I shall be
safe," I suggested, "and yet in full sight of the room where the
young gentlemen play. I wish to catch him at his tricks. Afterward--
"All will be well," he finished smoothly, with another glance at my
blue ribbon. "You see I do not ask you the young gentleman's name.
I take your money and leave all the rest to you. Only don't make a
scandal, I pray, for my house has the name of being quiet."
"Yes," thought I, "too quiet!" and for an instant felt my spirits
fail me. But it was only for an instant. I had friends about me and
a pistol at half-cock in the pocket of my overcoat. Why should I
fear any surprise, prepared as I was for every emergency?
"I will show you up in a moment," said he; and left me to put up a
heavy board shutter over the window opening on the river. Was this a
signal or a precaution? I glanced toward my two friends playing
cards, took another note of their broad shoulders and brawny arms,
and prepared to follow my host, who now stood bowing at the other end
of the room, before a covered staircase which was manifestly the sole
means of reaching the floor above.
The staircase was quite a feature in the room. It ran from back to
front, and was boarded all the way up to the ceiling. On these
boards hung a few useless bits of chain, wire, and knotted ends of
tarred ropes, which swung to and fro as the sharp November blast
struck the building, giving out a weird and strangely muffled sound.
Why did this sound, so easily to be accounted for, ring in my ears
like a note of warning? I understand now, but I did not then, full
of expectation as I was for developments out of the ordinary.
Crossing the room, I entered upon the staircase, in the wake of my
companion. Though the two men at cards did not look up as I passed
them, I noticed that they were alert and ready for any signal I might
choose to give them. But I was not ready to give one yet. I must
see danger before I summoned help, and there was no token of danger
yet.
When we were about half-way up the stairs the faint light which had
illuminated us from below suddenly vanished, and we found ourselves
in total darkness. The door at the foot had been closed by a careful
hand, and I felt, rather than heard, the stealthy pushing of a bolt
across it.
My first impulse was to forsake my guide and rush back, but I subdued
the unworthy impulse and stood quite still, while my companion,
exclaiming, "Damn that fellow! What does he mean by shutting the
door before we're half-way up!" struck a match and lit a gas jet in
the room above, which poured a flood of light upon the staircase.
Drawing my hand from the pocket in which I had put my revolver, I
hastened after him into the small landing at the top of the stairs.
An open door was before me, in which he stood bowing, with the
half-burnt match in his hand. "This is the place, sir," he
announced, motioning me in.
I entered and he remained by the door, while I passed quickly about
the room, which was bare of every article of furniture save a
solitary table and chair. There was not even a window in it, with
the exception of one small light situated so high up in the corner
made by the jutting staircase that I wondered at its use, and was
only relieved of extreme apprehension at the prison-like appearance
of the place by the gleam of light which came through this dusty
pane, showing that I was not entirely removed from the presence of my
foes if I, was from that of my friends.
"Ah, you have spied the window," remarked my host, advancing toward
me with a countenance he vainly endeavored to make reassuring and
friendly. "That is your post of observation, sir," he whispered,
with a great show of mystery. "By mounting on the table you can peer
into the room where my young friends sit securely at play."
As it was not part of my scheme to show any special mistrust, I
merely smiled a little grimly, and cast a glance at the table on
which stood a bottle of brandy and one glass.
"Very good brandy," he whispered; "not such stuff as we give those
fellows downstairs."
I shrugged my shoulders and he slowly backed toward the door.
"The young men you bid me watch are very quiet," I suggested, with a
careless wave of my hand toward the room he had mentioned.
"Oh, there is no one there yet. They begin to straggle in about ten
o'clock."
"Ah," was my quiet rejoinder, "I am likely, then, to have use for
your brandy."
He smiled again and made a swift motion toward the door.
"If you want anything," said he, "just step to the foot of the
staircase and let me know. The whole establishment is at your
service." And with one final grin that remains in my mind as the
most threatening and diabolical I have ever witnessed, he laid his
hand on the knob of the door and slid quickly out.
It was done with such an air of final farewell that I felt my
apprehensions take a positive form. Rushing toward the door through
which he had just vanished, I listened and heard, as I thought, his
stealthy feet descend the stair. But when I sought to follow, I
found myself for the second time overwhelmed by darkness. The gas
jet, which had hitherto burned with great brightness in the small
room, had been turned off from below, and beyond the faint glimmer
which found its way through the small window of which I have spoken,
not a ray of light now disturbed the heavy gloom of this gruesome
apartment.
I had thought of every contingency but this, and for a few minutes my
spirits were dashed. But I soon recovered some remnants of
self-possession, and began feeling for the knob I could no longer
see. Finding it after a few futile attempts, I was relieved to
discover that this door at last was not locked; and, opening it with
a careful hand, I listened intently, but could hear nothing save the
smothered sound of men talking in the room below.
Should I signal for my companions? No, for the secret was not yet
mine as to how men passed from this room into the watery grave which
was the evident goal for all wearers of the blue ribbon.
Stepping back into the middle of the room, I carefully pondered my
situation, but could get no further than the fact that I was somehow,
and in some way, in mortal peril. Would it come in the form of a
bullet, or a deadly thrust from an unseen knife? I did not think so.
For, to say nothing of the darkness, there was one reassuring fact
which recurred constantly to my mind in connection with the murders I
was endeavoring to trace to this den of iniquity.
None of the gentlemen who had been found drowned had shown any marks
of violence on their bodies, so it was not attack I was to fear, but
some mysterious, underhanded treachery which would rob me of
consciousness and make the precipitation of my body into the water
both safe and easy. Perhaps it was in the bottle of brandy that the
peril lay; perhaps--but why speculate further! I would watch till
midnight and then, if nothing happened, signal my companions to raid
the house.
Meantime a peep into the next room might help me toward solving the
mystery. Setting the bottle and glass aside, I dragged the table
across the floor, placed it under the lighted window, mounted, and
was about to peer through, when the light in that apartment was put
out also. Angry and overwhelmed, I leaped down, and, stretching out
my hands till they touched the wainscoting, I followed the wall
around till I came to the knob of the door, which I frantically
clutched. But I did not turn it immediately, I was too anxious to
catch these villains at work.
Would I be conscious of the harm they meditated against me, or would
I imperceptibly yield to some influence of which I was not yet
conscious, and drop to the floor before I could draw my revolver or
put to my mouth the whistle upon which I depended for assistance and
safety? It was hard to tell, but I determined to cling to my first
intention a little longer, and so stood waiting and counting the
minutes, while wondering if the captain of the police boat was not
getting impatient, and whether I had not more to fear from the
anxiety of my friends than the cupidity of my foes.
You see, I had anticipated communicating with the men in this boat by
certain signals and tokens which had been arranged between us. But
the lack of windows in the room had made all such arrangements
futile, so I knew as little of their actions as they did of my
sufferings; all of which did not tend to add to the cheerfulness of
my position.
However, I held out for a half-hour, listening, waiting, and watching
in a darkness which, like that of Egypt, could be felt, and when the
suspense grew intolerable I struck a match and let its blue flame
flicker for a moment over the face of my watch. But the matches soon
gave out and with them my patience, if not my courage, and I
determined to end the suspense by knocking at the door beneath.
This resolution taken, I pulled open the door before me and stepped
out. Though I could see nothing, I remembered the narrow landing at
the top of the stairs, and, stretching out my arms, I felt for the
boarding on either hand, guiding myself by it, and began to descend,
when something rising, as it were, out of the cavernous darkness
before me made me halt and draw back in mingled dread and horror.
But the impression, strong as it was, was only momentary, and,
resolved to be done with the matter, I precipitated myself downward,
when suddenly, at about the middle of the staircase, my feet slipped
and I slid forward, plunging and reaching out with hands whose
frenzied grasp found nothing to cling to, down a steep inclined
plane--or what to my bewildered senses appeared such--till I struck a
yielding surface and passed with one sickening plunge into the icy
waters of the river, which in another moment had closed dark and
benumbing above my head.
It was all so rapid I did not think of uttering a cry. But happily
for me the splash I made told the story, and I was rescued before I
could sink a second time.
It was full half an hour before I had sufficiently recovered from the
shock to relate my story. But when once I had made it known, you can
imagine the gusto with which the police prepared to enter the house
and confound the obliging host with a sight of my dripping garments
and accusing face. And, indeed, in all my professional experience I
have never beheld a more sudden merging of the bully into a coward
than was to be seen in this slick villain's face, when I was suddenly
pulled from the crowd and placed before him, with the old man's wig
gone from my head, and the tag of blue ribbon still clinging to my
wet coat.
His game was up, and he saw it; and Ebenezer Gryce's career had begun.
Like all destructive things the device by which I had been run into
the river was simple enough when understood. In the first place it
had been constructed to serve the purpose of a stairway and chute.
The latter was in plain sight when it was used by the sailmakers to
run the finished sails into the waiting yawls below. At the time of
my adventure, and for some time before, the possibilities of the
place had been discovered by mine host, who had ingeniously put a
partition up the entire stairway, dividing the steps from the smooth
runway. At the upper part of the runway he had built a few steps,
wherewith to lure the unwary far enough down to insure a fatal
descent. To make sure of his game he had likewise ceiled the upper
room all around, including the inclosure of the stairs.
The door to the chute and the door to the stairs were side by side,
and being made of the same boards as the wainscoting, were scarcely
visible when closed, while the single knob that was used, being
transferable from one to the other, naturally gave the impression
that there was but one door. When this adroit villain called my
attention to the little window around the corner, he no doubt removed
the knob from the stairs door and quickly placed it in the one
opening upon the chute. Another door, connecting the two similar
landings without, explains how he got from the chute staircase into
which he passed on leaving me, to the one communicating with the room
below.
The mystery was solved, and my footing on the force secured; but to
this day--and I am an old man now--I have not forgotten the horror of
the moment when my feet slipped from under me, and I felt myself
sliding downward, without hope of rescue, into a pit of heaving
waters, where so many men of conspicuous virtue had already ended
their valuable lives.
Myriad thoughts flashed through my brain in that brief interval, and
among them the whole method of operating this death-trap, together
with every detail of evidence that would secure the conviction of the
entire gang.
The Path of Murtogh
BY HAROLD FREDERIC
A curse is laid on one long narrow strip of the sea, down in front of
Dunlogher.
No matter how lifeless the sunlit air may hang above; no matter how
silken-smooth the face of the waters nearest by, lifting themselves
without a ripple in the most indolent summer swell--an angry churning
goes always forward here. Disordered currents will never tire of
their coiling and writhing somewhere underneath: the surface is
streaked with sinister markings like black shadows, which yet are no
shadows at all; and these glide without ceasing out and in among the
twisted lines of gray-white scum, and everything moves and nothing
changes, till Judgment Day. It has the name of the _Slighe
Mhuircheartaigh_ (spoken Shlee Vurharthee), or the Path of Murtogh.
Though 'tis well known that the grandest ling and turbot and
wonderful other big fishes lie swaying themselves in the depths of
this wicked water, with giant crayfish and crabs to bear them
company, the fishermen of Dunmanus and Goleen and Crookhaven, and
even the strangers from Cape Clear, would not buy a soul from
Purgatory at the price of drawing a net through it. They have a
great wish to please the buyers in the English ships, and the Scotch
and Manx, Oh, yes--but a creel of gold would not tempt them to meddle
in "Murty's Path." They steer their boats far to one side, and bless
themselves as they pass, in the manner of their fathers and
grandfathers before them.
These poor men, having not much of the Irish now, and not rightly
understanding what their elders may have heard the truth of, say that
this snake-like forbidding stretch wears its name from Murty _Oge_
O'Sullivan. Their thought is that the uncanny boiling began in the
wake of the English Speedwell, as the corpse of the vanquished
privateer spun and twirled at her keel through the foam, on its
savage last journey from Castletown to Cork. But it is enough to
look down at this evil place, to see that the malediction upon it
must be older than Murty _Oge's_ time, which, in the sight of
Dunlogher, was as yesterday. Why, men are living this year who
talked with men who saw his head spiked over South gate. There were
no great curses left unused in Ireland at so late a day as his. And
again, would it be the waters of Dunlogher that would tear themselves
for an O'Sullivan?
No, the curse threads back a dozen lives behind poor Murty _Oge_.
The strange currents weave and twine, and the greasy foam spreads and
gathers, gathers and spreads, in the path of another, whose
birthright it was that they should baptize him. The true tale is of
Murty the Proud, or if you will have his style from the Book of
Schull--Murtogh _Mordha_ O'Mahony, chief in Dunlogher. And his time
is not so distant, in one way, as men take account of years. But in
another it is too remote for any clear vision, because the "little
people" of the old, fearful kind had left every other part of
Ireland, and they were just halting together for a farewell pause in
Dunlogher, by reason of its being the last end of the land, and their
enchantments fanned up a vapor about Murty _Mordha_ to his undoing.
And it is as if that mist still rose between us and his story.
I
When the sun began to sink out of sight, down behind the sea, two men
stood on the edge of the great cliff of Dunlogher, their faces turned
to the west.
The yellow flame from the sky shone full in the eyes of Murtogh, and
he held his huge, bare head erect with boldness, and stared back at
it without blinking. His companion, a little, shriveled old man,
whom he held by the arm, had the glowing light on his countenance as
well, but his eyelids were shut. He bent himself against his chief's
thick shoulder and trembled.
"Are we to the brink itself?" he asked; his aged voice shook when he
spoke.
"Here, where I stand, when I would grip you, and hold you forth at
the length of my arm, and open my hand, you would fall a hundred
fathoms in the air." Murtogh's free arm and hand made the terrible
gesture to fit his words, but he tightened his protecting clasp upon
the other, and led him back a few paces. The old man groaned his
sigh of relief.
"It is you who are the brave nobleman, Murty," he whispered,
admiringly. "There is none to equal your strength, or your grand
courage, in all the land. And the heart of pure gold along with it!"
Murtogh tossed his big head, to shake the twisted forelock of his
hair to one side. "I looked straight into the sun at noon on St.
John's Day," he said, quietly, with the pride of a child. "If it
were a hundred times as bright, I would look at it, and never fear
for my eyes. I would hold my own son out here, stretched over the
abyss, and he would be no safer in his bed. Whatever I wished to do,
I would do it."
"You would--Oh, you would!" assented the old man, in tones of entire
sincerity.
The chieftain kept his eyes on the skyline, beneath which, as the
radiance above deepened, the waters grew ashen and coldly dark.
Musing, he held his silence for a time. Then, with abruptness, he
asked:
"What age were you, Owny Hea, when the McSwineys put out your eyes?
Were you strong enough to remember the sun well?"
"I was of no strength at all," the other whimpered, the tragedy of
his childhood affecting his speech on the instant. "I was in my
mother's arms. There were the men breaking in through the wall, and
the kine bellowing outside, and my father cut down; and then it was
like my mother drew her cloak tight over my head--and no one came
ever to take it off again. I forget the sun."
Murtogh nodded his head. "I will go to Muskerry some day," he said,
in a kindly way. "I cannot tell when, just now; but I will go, and I
will burn and desolate everything for six miles around, and you shall
have a bag for your harp made of eyelids of the McSwineys."
Old Owny lifted his sightless face toward his master, and smiled with
wistful affection. "Ah, Murty, dear," he expostulated, mildly, "it
is you who have the grand nature; but think, Murty--I am a very old
man, and no kin of yours. It is fifty years since the last man who
took my eyes drew breath. If you went now, no living soul could tell
what you came for, or why the great suffering was put upon them.
And, moreover, the O'Mahonys Carbery have wives from the McSwineys
these three generations. No feud lies now."
The lord of Dunlogher growled sharply between his teeth, and Owny
shrank further back.
"How long will you be learning," Murtogh demanded, with an arrogant
note in his voice, "that I have no concern in the O'Mahonys Carbery,
or the O'Mahonys _Fonn-Iartarach_, or any other? I do not take heed
of Conogher of Ardintenant, or Teige of Rosbrin, or Donogh of
Dunmanus, or Donal of Leamcon. I will give them all my bidding to
do, and they will do it, or I will kill them, and spoil their
castles. You could not behold it, but you have your song from the
words of others: how last year I fell upon Diarmaid _Bhade_, and
crushed him and his house, and slew his son, and brought away his
herds. His father's father and mine were brothers. He is nearer to
me in blood than the rest, yet I would not spare him. I made his
Ballydevlin a nest for owls and bats. Let the others observe what I
did. I am in Dunlogher, and I am the O'Mahony here, and I look the
sun in the face like an eagle. Put that to your song!"
The sound came to them, from the walled bawn and gateways beyond the
Three Castles, a hundred yards behind, of voices in commotion. The
old bard lifted his head, and his brow scored itself in lines of
listening attention. If Murtogh heard, he gave no sign, but gazed
again in meditation out upon the vast waste of waters, blackening now
as the purple reflections of the twilight waned.
"Blind men have senses that others lack," he remarked at last. "Tell
me, you, does the earth we stand on seem ever to you to be turning
round?"
Owny shuddered a little at the thought which came to him. "When you
led me out beyond here, and I felt the big round sea-pinks under my
feet, and remembered they grew only on the very edge--" he began.
"Not that," the chief broke in, "'tis not my meaning. But at Kosbrin
there was a book written by Fineen the son of Diarmaid, an uncle to
my father's father, and my father heard it read from this book that
the world turned round one way, like a duck on a spit, and the sun
turned round the other way, and that was why they were apart all
night. And often I come here, and I swear there is a movement under
my feet. But elsewhere there is none, not in the bawn, or in the
towers, or anywhere else but just here."
The old man inclined his face, as if he could see the ground he stood
upon, but shook his head after a moment's waiting. "It would not be
true, Murty," he suggested. "Old Fineen had a mighty scholarship, as
I have heard, and he made an end to edify the angels, but--but--"
Murtogh did not wait for the hesitating conclusion. "I saw his tomb
when I was a lad, in the chapel at Rosbrin. He was laid at his own
desire under a weight of stone like my wall here. I saw even then
how foolish it was. These landsmen have no proper sense. How will
they rise at the blessed Resurrection, with all that burden of stone
to hold them down? I have a better understanding than that. I
buried my father, as he buried his father, out yonder in the sea.
And I will be buried there, too, and my son after me--and if I have
other children--" he stole a swift glance at the old man's withered
face as he spoke--"if I have others, I say, it will be my command
that they shall follow me there, when their time comes. I make you
witness to that wish, Owny Hea."
The bard hung his head. "As if my time would not come first!" he
said, for the mere sake of saying something. Then, gathering
courage, he pulled upon the strong arm which was still locked in his,
and raised his head to speak softly in the O'Mahony's ear.
"If only the desire of your heart were given you, Murty," he
murmured; "if only once I could hold a babe of yours to my breast,
and put its pretty little hands in my beard--I'd be fit to pray for
the men who took my eyes from me. And Murty dear"--his voice rose in
tremulous entreaty as he went on--"tell me, Murty--I'm of an age to
be your father's father, and I've no eyesight to shame you--is
she--is your holy wife coming to see her duty differently? Have you
hope that--that--?"
Murtogh turned abruptly on his heel, swinging his companion round
with him. They walked a dozen paces toward the sea-gate of the
castles, before he spoke. "You have never seen her, Owny!" he said,
gravely. "You do not know at all how beautiful she is. It is not in
the power of your mind to imagine it. There is no one like her in
all the world. She is not just flesh and blood like you, Owny, or
even like me. I am a great lord among men, Owny, and I am not afraid
of any man. I would put the MacCarthy, or even the Earl of Desmond,
over my cliff like a rat, if he came to me here, and would not do me
honor. But whenever I come where she sits, I am like a little dirty
boy, frightened before a great shrine of our Blessed Lady, all with
jewels and lights and incense. I take shame to myself when she looks
at me, that there are such things in my heart for her to see."
Owny sighed deeply. "The grandest princess in the world might be
proud to be mated to you, Murty," he urged.
"True enough," responded Murtogh, with candor. "But she is not a
princess--or any mere woman at all. She is a saint. Perhaps she is
more still. Listen, Owny. Do you remember how I took her--how I
swam for her through the breakers--and snapped the bone of my arm to
keep the mast of their wreck from crushing her when the wave flung it
upon us, and still made land with her head on my neck, and hung to
the bare rock against all the devils of the sea sucking to pull me
down--?"
"Is it not all in my song?" said Owny, with gentle reproach.
"Owny, man, listen!" said Murtogh, halting and giving new
impressiveness to his tone. "I took her from the water. Her
companions were gone; their vessel was gone. Did we ever see sign of
them afterward? And her family--the Sigersons of that island beyond
Tiobrad--when men of mine sailed thither, and asked for Hugh, son of
Art, were they not told that the O'Flaherty had passed over the
island, and left nothing alive on it the size of a mussel shell?
Draw nearer to me, Owny. You will be thinking the more without your
eyes. Have you thought that it may be she--whisper now!--that she
may belong to the water?"
They stood motionless in the gathering twilight, and the bard turned
the problem over deliberately. At last he seemed to shake his head.
"_They_ would not be displaying such piety, as the old stories of
them go," he suggested, "or--I mean it well to you, Murty--or
breaking husbands' hearts with vows of celibacy."
The O'Mahony pushed the old man from him. "Then if she be a saint,"
he cried, "why then it were better for me to make ten thousand more
blind men like you, and tear my own eyes out, and lead you all
headlong over the cliff there, than risk the littlest offense to her
pure soul!"
The old bard held out a warning hand. "People are coming!" he said.
Then gliding towards his chief, he seized the protecting arm again,
and patted it, and fawned against it. "Where you go, Murty," he said
eagerly, "I follow. What you say, I say."
Some dancing lights had suddenly revealed themselves at the corner of
the nearest castle wall. Murtogh had not realized before that it was
dusk. "They will be looking for me," he said, and moved forward,
guiding his companion's steps. The thought that with Owny it was
always dark rose in him, and drove other things away.
Three men with torches came up--rough men with bare legs and a single
skirt-like tunic of yellow woollen cloth, and uncovered heads with
tangled and matted shocks of black hair. The lights they bore
gleamed again in the fierce eyes which looked out from under their
forelocks.
"O'Mahony," one of them said, "the Haitian priest is at the
gate--young Donogh, son of Donogh _Bhade_ who fled to Spain. He is
called Father Donatus now."
"What will he want here?" growled Murtogh. "I have beaten his
father; if I have the mind, his tonsure will not hold me from beating
him also."
"He has brought a foreign Spaniard, a young man with breeches and a
sword, who comes to you from the King of Spain."
Murtogh straightened himself, and disengaged the arm of the blind
man. "Run forward, you two," he ordered sharply, "and call all the
men from the bawns and the cattle and the boats, and I will have them
light torches, and stand in a line from the second tower to the
postern, and show their spears well in front, and be silent. I will
not have any man talk but myself, or thrust himself into notice. We
were Kings of Rathlin, and we have our own matters to discuss with
the Kings of Spain."
II
Three score fighting men, some bearing lights, and all showing
shields, and spears, or javelins, or long hooked axes, crowded in the
semblance of a line along the narrow way to the large keep--and
behind them packed four times their number of women and
children--watched Murtogh when he brought his guests past from the
gate.
He moved proudly up the boreen, with a slow step, and the gleam of a
high nature in his eyes. His own people saw afresh how great was his
right to be proud. The broad hard muscles of his legs, straining to
burst their twisted leather thongs as he walked; the vast weight and
thickness of the breast and shoulders, under the thin summer cloak of
cloth from the Low Countries which he held wrapped tight about them;
the corded sinews of his big bare neck; above all, the lion-like
head, with its dauntless regard and its splendid brown-black mane,
and the sparkle of gold in the bushing glibb on his brow--where else
in all Ireland would their match be found? But for that strange
injunction to silence, the fighters of the sept would be splitting
the air with yells for their chieftain. They struck their weapons
together, and made the gaze they bent upon him burn with meaning, and
he, without looking, read it, and bore himself more nobly yet; and
the mothers and wives and little ones, huddled behind in the
darkness, groaned aloud with the pain of their joy in Murty _mordha_.
It swelled the greatness of Murtogh when they looked upon those who
followed him. "It is the _soggarth liathan_," they whispered, at
view of the young priest, with his pointed face and untimely whitened
hair. He would not turn his ferret glance to right or left, as he
followed close in his cousin's lordly footsteps, for the reason that
these sea-wolves of Dunlogher had ravaged and burnt his father's
country within the year, and slain his brother, and gnashed their
teeth now, even as he passed, for rage at the sight of him.
And the messenger who came to speak to Murty the words of the King of
Spain! They grinned as they stared upon him. An eel-fly, a lame
fledgeling gull, a young crab that has lost its shell--thus they
murmured of him. His legs were scarce the bigness of a Cape woman's
arms, and were clad in red silken cloth stretched as close as skin.
He had foolish little feet, with boots of yellow leather rising to
the knee, and from the mid-thigh to the waist were unseemly bulging
breeches, blown out like a buoy, and gashed down-wise with stripes of
glowing colors, repeated again in his flowing sleeves. His burnished
steel corslet and long reed-like sword would be toys for children in
Dunlogher. His face, under its wide plumed hat of drab felt, was
that of no soldier at all--a thin, smooth, rounded face of a strange
smoky darkness of hue, with tiny upturned moustachios, and delicately
bended nose. And the eyes of him! They seemed to be the half of his
countenance in size, what with their great dusky-white balls, and
sloe-black centers, and their thick raven fringes and brows that
joined each other. The armed kernes who stood nearest took not much
heed of these eyes, but the older women, peeping between their
shoulders, saw little else, and they made the sign of the cross at
the sight.
When two hours had passed, the baser folk of Dunlogher knew roughly
what was in the wind. Two wayfaring men of humble station had come
in the train of the Spaniard, and though they had no Irish, their
story somehow made itself told. A ship from Spain, which indeed
Dunlogher had seen pass a week before, had put in at Dingle, on the
Kerry coast, and had landed James Fitzmaurice, the Papal legate
Sanders, some other clergy, and a score and more Spanish gentlemen or
men at arms, with a banner blessed by the Holy Father. A great army
from Spain and Italy would follow in their wake. But, meantime, the
first comers were building a fort at Smerwick, and the clan of
Fitzgerald was up, and messengers were flying through the length and
breadth of Munster and Connaught, passing the word to the Catholic
chiefs that the hour of driving the English into the sea was at hand.
The lower floors of the castle and the pleasant grassy bawns outside,
cool with the soft sea wind of the summer night, were stirred to a
common fervor by these tidings. The other O'Mahonys, the chiefs of
Dunmanus and Dunbeacon to the north, of Ballydevlin, Leamcon,
Ardintenant, and Rosbrin to the south, and elsewhere in Desmond the
O'Sullivans, MacCarthys, O'Driscolls and the rest, were clashing
their shields. Ah, when they should see Murty striding into the
field!
In the big hall overhead, where--after three courses of stone stairs
were climbed, so narrow that a man in armor must needs walk
sideways--the abode of the chieftain and his own blood began, Murtogh
was ready to hear the message of the King of Spain.
The broad rough-hewn table, with its dishes of half-cleaned bones and
broken cheeses and bread, its drinking horns and flagons, and litter
of knives and spoons, had been given over to the master's greyhounds,
who stood with forepaws on the board and insinuated their long necks
and muzzles noiselessly here and there among the remains of the meal.
A clump of reeds, immersed in a brazier of fish oil, burned smokily
among the dishes for light.
When, at the finish of the eating, Murtogh had given the signal for
departure to the dozen strong men nearest akin to him, or in his best
favor, there were left only his son, a slow, good lad born of a first
wife long since dead, the blind Owny, the Spaniard and the _liathan_
(or prematurely gray) young priest.
Then Murtogh said to this last man: "Donogh, son of Donogh Shade, I
have not frowned on you nor struck you, for the reason that you are
my guest. But because my hand is open to you, it is no reason that I
should lie, and pretend that I am your friend or you mine. Your
brother, Diarmaid, the one I could not get to kill, calls himself my
heir, and twice has sought to take the life of my son here, my Donogh
_baoth_. Therefore, I will have you go now, and sit below with the
others, or read your prayers in your chamber where you are to sleep,
because I will hear now what the King of Spain says to me, and that
is not meant for your ears."
The priest stood on his feet. "Your pride does not become you, Murty
_Mordha_," he said, "when I am come to you for your soul's sake and
the glory of religion." His voice was thin and high-pitched, but
there was no fear in it.
"I will not be taking trouble for my soul just now," replied Murty;
"that will be for another time, when I am like to die. And then I
will have my own confessor, and not you, nor anyone like you. So you
will go now, as I bid you."
Father Donatus, standing still, curled his lips in a hard smile.
"You are a great man, Murty! You could dishonor my father, and slay
my brother like the headstrong bullock that you are; but there are
things you cannot do. You cannot lay your finger to me because I
come on the business of God."
"It is the business of the King of Spain that I will be thinking of,"
said Murty, with curtness.
"They are the same," rejoined the young priest. "And you are wrong
to say what you will be thinking of, because you have not a mind to
think at all. If you could think, you would know that you cannot
have the words of the King of Spain except when I interpret them to
you. This noble gentleman who comes with me speaks more tongues than
one, but he had no Irish, and you--it is well known that you have
nothing else. Don Tello has sat at your side for two hours, and you
have not observed that each word between him and you came and went
through me. Oh, yes; you are a great man, Murty, but your mind is
not of a high order."
The chieftain rose also. The blood came into his face, and he laid a
strong hand on the hilt of his broad sword. But the foot that he
lifted he set down again; and he looked at his kinsman, the _liathan_
priest, and did not move toward him. "You are in the right to wear a
gown," he said slowly, "because you have the tongue and the evil
temper of an ugly girl. You speak foolish things in your heat, and
they disgrace you. I have the best mind that any man in my family
ever had. I have more thoughts in my mind than there are words in
your Latin book. I would speak whatever I chose to this gentleman,
and I would understand his speech when I troubled myself to do so.
But I will not do that--for some time at least; I will have my wife
come, and she will sit here, and she will tell me his words, and I
will be taking my ease."
Murtogh _Mordha_ called his son to his side, and gave him a message
to deliver.
The priest, smiling in his cold way, leant over and spoke for the
space of a minute in a tongue strange to Dunlogher into the
Spaniard's ear. Then he stood erect, and gazed at Murtogh with an
ill-omened look, and so turned and strode after the lad out of the
door.
III
A young woman of the rarest beauty, tall and slender, and with the
carriage of a great lady, came into the chamber and moved across to
the high, carved chair which Murtogh made ready for her, and seated
herself upon it as upon a throne. She had a pale, fair skin, and her
hair, coiled heavily in plaits upon her shoulders, was of the hue of
a red harvest sun. There were jewels in this hair and upon her
throat and hands, and her long robes were of rich, shining stuffs. A
chain of wooden beads, with a cross of gold at the end, hung from her
girdle, and she gathered this in her fingers as she sat.
The boy, Donogh _baoth_, came with her, and crouched in humility on
the floor at her side. His thick form and dark hair, and his
over-large head, spoke a likeness now to his father which was not to
be noted before. When, as if under the spell of her attraction, he
nestled nearer the lady's chair, and touched her garment with his
hand, she drew it away.
Murtogh _Mordha_, before he took his seat again, and leant back to
half lie upon the skins thrown over it, told her the Spaniard's name,
and explained to her his errand. The Spaniard, bowing himself low,
sank upon one knee, and reverently kissed her hand, as Murty had seen
his father kiss the ring of the Bishop of Ross. He was proud to
observe this, because his wife was holier and more saintly still than
any bishop.
The lady smiled upon the Spaniard, and all that she said to him, and
he to her, was in his tongue. "I cannot speak it well," she said.
Her voice had the sweetness of a perfume in the air. "I lived at
Seville, in the old convent there, for only two years. I have no joy
of remembrance now, save in the peace and charm of those years there;
but I fear my memory of the dear speech is dimmed. But I will listen
with all my ears--and oh, so gladly!"
She fastened her regard upon his eyes--the great, rolling, midnight
eyes--and held it there, that she might the better follow his speech.
"Beautiful lady," the Spaniard said, "I learn only now the power our
language, spoken by such lips, may have to enthrall the hearing.
Condone my error, I pray you, but I caught from Father Donatus that
you were this strong chieftain's wife, and I see that you are his
daughter; and even that is strange, to look upon him and _you_."
"I am his wife, but only in name, naught else," she answered. The
wave of comprehension sweeping over the surface of the Spaniard's
eyes made instant confidence between them. "I am in captivity here.
He is a pirate, a Goth, a murderous barbarian. He and his savages
here--but of this more a little hence. I beg you now to speak
something of your mission--your errand here. He is as helpless to
follow our words as one of those hounds; but no dog is keener to
suspicion."
The Spaniard with eager swiftness of speech, piled one upon another
the curtailed topics of his business. The lady, moving her fingers
along the beads, gleaned the narrow pith of it, and dressed it forth
in new phrases for the lord of Dunlogher.
"_The King of Spain will send this month,_" she said in the Irish,
"_a mighty army to drive the heretic English to the last man from
this Island of Saints. They have wounded God too long! The last
drop of Heaven's patience is dried up by their crimes. Their Queen
was not born in lawful wedlock, and the Blessed Sacraments, are daily
profaned by her and her accursed people. Those who sustain and honor
God now will be sustained and honored by Him through glorious
Eternity._"
"These things are well known to me," said Murtogh. "I would not need
the King of Spain to tell them to me. How will he speak concerning
myself?"
The lady was not afraid to smile into the eyes of the Spaniard. "You
are to speak after a moment or two," she told him, with a calm voice;
"but hear me this little first. My heart is broken here. I do not
know how I have had the courage to live. These jewels I wear, the
fabrics of my raiment, the wines on the board yonder, are all the
booty of blood-stained waves down at the foot of this terrible cliff.
He and his savages burn false lights, and lure ships to the rocks,
and rob and murder their people. It was thus unhappily I came here,
and in fear of my life, while I was still half dead from the water, I
suffered the marriage words to be read over me--but now you must
speak."
"I would show you tears rather than words, dear lady," the Spaniard
said; "and blows on your behalf more preferably than either. Father
Donatus whispered the tithe of this to me. The whole truth burns
like fire in my heart. As my fathers gave their life blood to drive
the infidel from Grenada--so lay my own poor life at your dear feet.
If aught but harm to you could come from it, I would slay him now
where he lolls there on the skins. He is looking at you now, waiting
for you to speak."
"_The King of Spain has heard much of you,_" she began in the Irish,
without turning her head. "_He is filled with admiration for your
strength and valor. He desires deeply to know what you will be
doing. When you will take arms, and join him with your great might
in the battles, then there cannot be any doubt of his victory._"
"That it is easy to see," replied Murtogh. "But the King of Spain's
battles are not my battles. There would be some reason to be given,
to call me out for his wars. The English will be doing me no hurt.
They cannot come here to me, by water or by land; and it they did I
would not let any of them depart alive. For what cause should I go
to them? Let the King of Spain tell me what it would be in his mind
to do in my behalf, when I did this thing for him."
The lady spoke to the Spaniard. "The last of my people are killed.
They would not have seemed different to you perhaps--to you who were
bred in the gentle graces of Spain--but they were not the ferocious
barbarians these O'Mahonys are. My father was learned in Latin and
English, and it was his dream that I should wed in Spain."
"Oh, rapturous vision!" said Don Tello, with new flames kindling in
his eyes. "And if it shall be proved prophetic as well, beautiful
lady! Something of this, too, the priest whispered; but the precious
words return to me as your dear lips breathed them forth--'wife only
in name.' I long to hear them once again."
The lady repeated them, with tender deliberation, and a languorous
gleam in her blue eyes began to answer his burning gaze. "I have
held the fierce beast at arm's length," she said, "because he is also
a fool. I would give a year of my life to be able to laugh in his
face, and slap these beads across it. I have told him--the blessed
thought came to me even while we knelt at the altar together--that I
am bound by a vow. His big empty head is open to all the fancies
that fly. He believes that an enchanted woman drives up her horses
from the bottom of the lake, down at the foot of the small tower
here, every night for food; and he spreads corn for them which the
thieves about him fatten on. He believes in witches rising from the
sea, and leprechauns, and changelings, like any ignorant herdsman out
in the bog, but he is a frightened Churchman, too. He believes that
I am a saint!"
"As I swear by the grave of my mother, you are!" panted Don Tello.
"But speak now to him."
"_The King of Spain will do very great things in your behalf,_" she
recited, in Murtogh's tongue. "_He will make you of the rank of a
commander in his armies, and he will ennoble you._"
"I am noble now," Murtogh made comment, "as noble as the King of
Spain himself. I am not a MacCarthy or an O'Driscoll, that I would
be craving titles to my name."
"_Then he will send large rich ships here,_" she began again, with
weariness in her tone, "_to bring you costly presents. And the Pope,
he will grant you ten years' indulgence,--or it may be twenty._"
"Ask him," broke in Murtogh, sitting up with a brightened face, his
hand outstretched to secure silence for the thought that stirred
within him--"ask if the Holy Father would be granting just the one
spiritual favor I would beg. Will this gentleman bind the King of
Spain to that?"
"And may I wholly trust," she asked the Spaniard, with half-closed
eyes, through which shone the invitation of her mood, "may I trust in
your knightly proffer of help? Do not answer till I have finished.
You are the first who has come to me--here in this awful dungeon--and
I have opened my heart to you as perhaps I should not. But you have
the blood of youth in your veins, like me; you are gallant and of
high lineage; you are from the land where chivalry is the law of
gentle life--is it true that you will be my champion?"
The Spaniard rose with solemn dignity, though his great eyes flashed
devouringly upon her, and his breast heaved under its cuirass. He
half lifted his sword from the sheath, and kissed the cross of its
hilt. "Oh, my beloved, I swear!" he said, in somber earnestness.
She translated the action and utterance to Murtogh. "_Whatever of a
spiritual nature you would crave of his Holiness he would grant._"
"But it would be a cruel time of waiting, to send all the long way to
Rome and back," he objected, "and this matter lies like lead upon my
soul."
She looked up into the Spaniard's eyes, and let her own lashes
tremble, and fed the ravening conflagration of his gaze with a little
sigh. "It would be very sweet to believe," she murmured, "too sweet
for sense, I fear me. Nay, Don Tello, I need not such a world of
persuasion--only--only--lift your right hand, with thumb and two
fingers out, and swear again. And say, 'Bera, I swear!'"
"It is your name?" he asked, and as she closed her eyes in assent,
and slowly opened them to behold his oath, he lifted the fingers and
waved them toward her, and passionately whispered, "Bera, queen of my
Heaven, star of my soul, I swear!"
"_That is the sign of the Pope himself,_" she explained, with
indifference, to Murtogh. "_Whatever wish you offered up you have it
already granted. It is Don Tello who bears the holy authority from
the Pope._"
The lord of Dunlogher hurled himself to his feet with a boisterous
energy before which the lady, wondering, drew herself away. He
stretched his bared arms toward her, then flung them upward as in
invocation to the skies. The beatitude of some vast triumph
illumined his glance.
"Oh, then, indeed, I am Murty _Mordha_!" he cried. "It is I who am
prouder than all the Kings on earth! It is I who have won my love!
Oh, glory to the Heavens that send me this joy! Glory and the praise
of the saints! Glory! Glory!"
The rhapsody was without meaning to the Spaniard. He stared in
astonishment at the big chieftain with the shining countenance who
shouted with such vehemence up at the oaken roof. Turning a glance
of inquiry at the lady, he saw that she had grown white-faced, and
was cowering backward in her chair.
"Our Lady, save us!" she gasped at him in Spanish. "He has asked the
Pope to absolve me from my vow."
Don Tello, no wiser, put his hand to his sword. "Tell me quickly,
what it is? What am I to do?" he demanded of her.
Murtogh, with a smile from the heart moistening his eyes and
transfiguring all his face, strode to the Spaniard, and grasped his
reluctant hand between his own broad palms, and gripped it with the
fervor of a giant.
"I would have you tell him," he called out to the Lady Bera. "Tell
him that he has no other friend in any land who will do for him what
Murty _Mordha_ will be doing. I will ride with him into the battle,
and take all his blows on my own back. I will call him my son and my
brother. Whatever he will wish, I will give it to him. And all his
enemies I will slay and put down for him to walk upon. Oh, Bera, the
jewel restored to me, the beautiful gem I saved from the waters, tell
him these things for me! Why will your lips be so silent? Would
they be waiting for my kisses to waken them? And Donogh, son of
mine, come hither and take my other son's hand. I will hear you
swear to keep my loyalty to him the same as myself. And, Owny
Hea--hither, man! You cannot see my benefactor, the man I will be
giving life for, but you have heard his voice. You will not forget
it."
The absence of all other sound of a sudden caught Murtogh's ear, and
checked his flow of joyous words. He looked with bewilderment at the
figure of his wife in the chair, motionless with clenched hands on
her knees, and eyes fixed in a dazed stare upon vacancy. He turned
again, and noted that Owny Hea had come up to the Spaniard, and was
standing before him so close that their faces were near touching.
The old blind man had the smile of an infant on his withered face.
He lifted his left hand to the Spaniard's breast and passed it
curiously over the corselet and its throat-plate and arm-holes,
muttering in Irish to himself, "I will not forget. I will not at all
forget."
A zigzag flash of light darted briefly somewhere across Murtogh's
vision Looking with more intentness he saw that both the blind man's
hands were at the arm-pit of the Spaniard and pulled upon something
not visible. Don Tello's big eyes seemed bursting from their
black-fringed sockets. His face was distorted, and he curled the
fingers of his hand like stiffened talons, and clawed once into the
air with them. Then Owny Hea pushed him, and he pitched sprawling
against Murtogh's legs, and rolled inert to the floor. His hot blood
washed over Murtogh's sandaled feet.
A woman's shriek of horror burst into the air, and the hounds moaned
and glided forward. Murtogh did not know why he stood so still. He
could not rightly think upon what was happening, or put his mind to
it. The bones in his arms were chilled, and would not move for him.
He gazed with round eyes at Owny, and at the red dripping knife which
the bard stretched out to him. He felt the rough tongue of a dog on
his ankle. The dark corners of the chamber seemed to be moving from
him a long distance away. There was a spell upon him, and he could
not tremble.
The voice of Owny Hea came to him, and though it was soundless, like
the speech of Dreamland, he heard all its words; "Murtogh son of
Teige, I have slain your guest for the reason that I have the
Spanish, and I knew the meaning of his words to this woman, and he
could not live any longer, The _liathan_ priest, when he would be
going, told this stranger that she you called your wife was your
enemy, and made a mockery of you, and would give ear gladly to any
means of dishonoring you. And the _liathan_ priest spoke truly.
While the woman repeated lies to you of the King of Spain and the
Pope, she whispered foul scandal of you, and wicked love-words to
that dog's-meat at your feet. It is I, Owen son of Aodh, who tell
you these things. And now you know what you have to do!"
Murtogh turned slowly to the lady. She lay, without motion, in her
chair, her head limp upon her shoulder, and the whiteness of sea foam
on her cheek. Thoughts came again into his brain.
"I have the wisest mind of all in my family," he said; "I know what
it is I will be doing."
He drew the short sword from his girdle, and put his nail along its
edge.
"_Donogh baoth_," he said to his son, "go below and seek out Conogher
_tuathal_ and Shane _buidhe_, and bid them seize the _liathan_ priest
between them, and bring him to me here where I am. And you will take
some sleep for yourself then, for it is a late hour."
The lad looked at the pale lady with the closed eyes, and at the
sword in his father's hand. He set his teeth together, and lifted
his head.
"I am of years enough to see it all," he said. "I have no sleep on
my eyes."
Murtogh bent over the corpse at his feet, and caressed the boy's head
with his hand. "I will not call you _baoth_ (simple) any more," he
said, fondly. "You are my true son, and here is my ring for your
finger, and you may return with them when they fetch me my _liathan_
cousin."
IV
Next morning young Donogh gave his word to the men of Dunlogher, and
they obeyed him, for in the one night he had thrown aside his
sluggish boyhood, and they saw his father's ring on his finger, and
heard a good authority in his voice. They came out from the Western
gate at his command, three-score and more, and stood from the brink
of the cliff inward, with their weapons in their hands, and made a
path between them. But the women and children Donogh bade remain
within the bawn, and he shut the inner gate upon them. It was as if
the smell of blood came to them there, for the old women put up a
lamentation of death, and the others cried aloud, till the noise
spread to the men on the cliff. These looked one to another and held
their silence.
They did not clash their spears together when, after a long waiting,
Murtogh came from the gate, and walked toward them. A fine rain was
in the air, and the skies and sea were gray, and the troubled man
would have no spirit for such greeting.
He bore upon his broad back a great shapeless bundle thrice his own
bulk. The weight of it bent his body, and swayed his footsteps as he
came. The cover of it was of skins of wild beasts, sewn rudely with
thongs, and through the gaps in this cover some of the men saw
stained foreign cloths and the plume of a hat, and some a shoe with a
priest's buckle, and some the marble hand of a fair woman. But no
word was spoken, and Murtogh, coming to the edge, heaved his huge
shoulders upward, and the bundle leaped out of sight.
Then Murtogh turned and looked all his fighting-men in their faces,
and smiled in gentleness upon them, and they saw that in that same
night, while the "little people" had changed Donogh into a man, they
had made Murtogh a child again.
"She came up from the water," he said to them, in a voice no man
knew. "It was I who brought her out of the water, and fought for her
with the demons under the rocks, and beat all of them off. But one
of them I did not make the sign of the Cross before, and that one is
the King of Spain; and so he has wrought me this mischief, and made
all my labor as nothing; and she is in the water again, and I must be
going to fetch her out rightly this time."
Murtogh sprang like a deer into the air, with a mighty bound which
bore him far over the edge of the cliff. Some there were, in the
throng that sprang forward, agile enough to be looking down the abyss
before his descent was finished. These, to their amazement, beheld a
miracle. For the great fall did not kill Murtogh _Mordha_, but the
waters boiled and rose to meet him, and held him up on their tossing
currents as he swam forward, and marked with a pallid breadth of foam
his path out to sea, farther and farther out, till the mists hid him
from human view.
The wailing song of Owny Hea rose through the wet air above the
keening of the women in the bawn. But louder still was the voice of
the lad who wore his father's ring, and drew now from beneath his
mantle his father's sword.
"I am Donogh son of Murtogh _Mordha_!" he shouted, "and I am Lord in
Dunlogher, and when I am of my full strength I will kill the King of
Spain, and give his castles and all his lands and herds and women to
you for your own!"
The three towers of Dunlogher are broken, and the witch has fled from
its gray lake, and no man knows where the bones of its forgotten sept
are buried. But the evil currents will never tire of writhing, and
the shadows which are no shadows are forever changing, in the Path of
Murty the Proud.
"There Is Sorrow on the Sea"
BY SIR GILBERT PARKER
I
YORK FACTORY, HUDSON'S BAY.
23rd September, 1747.
MY DEAR COUSIN FANNY--It was a year last April Fool's Day, I left you
on the sands there at Mablethorpe, no more than a stone's throw from
the Book-in-Hand, swearing that you should never see or hear from me
again. You remember how we saw the coastguards flash their lights
here and there, as they searched the sands for me? how one came
bundling down the bank, calling, "Who goes there?" and when I said,
"A friend," he stumbled, and his light fell to the sands and went
out, and in the darkness you and I stole away: you to your home, with
a whispering, "God-bless-you, Cousin Dick," over your shoulder, and I
with a bit of a laugh that, maybe, cut you to the heart, and that
split in a sob in my own throat--though you didn't hear that.
'Twas a bad night's work that, Cousin Fanny, and maybe I wish it
undone; and maybe I don't; but a devil gets into the heart of a man
when he has to fly from the lass he loved, while the friends of his
youth go hunting him with muskets, and he has to steal out of the
back-door of his own country and shelter himself, like a cold
sparrow, up in the eaves of the world.
Ay, lass, that's how I left the fens of Lincolnshire a year last
April Fool's Day. There wasn't a dyke from Lincoln town to
Mablethorpe that I hadn't crossed with a running jump; and there
wasn't a break in the shore, or a sink-hole in the sand, or a clump
of rushes, or a samphire bed, from Skegness to Theddlethorpe, that I
didn't know like every line of your face. And when I was a slip of a
lad--ay, and later, too--how you and I used to snuggle into little
nooks of the sand-hills, maybe just beneath the coastguard's hut, and
watch the tide come swilling in--daisies you used to call the
breaking surf, Cousin Fanny! And that was like you, always with a
fancy about everything you saw. And when the ships, the
fishing-smacks with their red sails, and the tall-masted brigs, went
by, taking the white foam on their canvas, you used to wish that you
might sail away to the lands you'd heard tell of from old skippers
that gathered round my uncle's fire in the Book-in-Hand. Ay, a grand
thing I thought it would be, too, to go riding round the world on a
well-washed deck, with plenty of food and grog, and maybe, by-and-by,
to be first mate, and lord it from fo'castle bunk to stern-rail!
You did not know, did you, who was the coastguardsman that stumbled
as he came on us that night? It looked a stupid thing to do that,
and let the lantern fall. But, lass, 'twas done o' purpose. That
was the one man in all the parish that would ha' risked his neck to
let me free. 'Twas Lancy Doane, who's give me as many beatings in
his time as I him. We were always getting foul one o' t'other since
I was big enough to shy a bit of turf at him across a dyke, and there
isn't a spot on's body that I haven't hit, nor one on mine that he
hasn't mauled. I've sat on his head, and he's had his knee in my
stomach till I squealed, and we never could meet without back-talking
and rasping 'gainst the grain. The night before he joined the
coastguardsmen, he was down at the Book-in-Hand, and 'twas little
like that I'd let the good chance pass--I might never have another;
for Gover'ment folk will not easy work a quarrel on their own
account. I mind him sittin' there on the settle, his shins against
the fire, a long pipe going, and Casey of the "Lazy Beetle," and
Jobbin the mate of the "Dodger," and Little Faddo, who had the fat
Dutch wife down by the Ship Inn, and Whiggle the preaching
blacksmith. And you were standin' with your back to the shinin'
pewters, and the great jug of ale with the white napkin behind you;
the light o' the fire wavin' on your face, and your look lost in the
deep hollow o' the chimney. I think of you most as you were that
minute, Cousin Fanny, when I come in. I tell you straight and fair,
that was the prettiest picture I ever saw; and I've seen some rare
fine things in my travels. 'Twas as if the thing had been set by
some one just to show you off to your best. Here you were, a slip of
a lass, straight as a bulrush, and your head hangin' proud on your
shoulders; yet modest too, as you can see off here in the North the
top of the golden-rod flower swing on its stem. You were slim as
slim, and yet there wasn't a corner on you; so soft and full and firm
you were, like the breast of a quail; and I mind me how the shine of
your cheeks was like the glimmer of an apple after you've rubbed it
with a bit of cloth. Well, there you stood in some sort of smooth,
plain, clingin' gown, a little bit loose and tumblin' at the throat,
and your pretty foot with a brown slipper pushed out, just savin' you
from bein' prim. That's why the men liked you--you didn't carry a
sermon in your waist-ribbon, and the Lord's Day in the lift o' your
chin; but you had a smile to give when 'twas the right time for it,
and men never said things with you there that they'd have said before
many another maid.
'Twas a thing I've thought on off here, where I've little to do but
think, how a lass like you could put a finger on the lip of such
rough tykes as Faddo, Jobbin, and the rest, keepin' their rude words
under flap and button. Do you mind how, when I passed you comin' in,
I laid my hand on yours as it rested on the dresser? That hand of
yours wasn't a tiny bit of a thing, and the fingers weren't all
taperin' like a simperin' miss from town, worked down in the mill of
quality and got from graftin' and graftin', like one of them roses
from the flower-house at Mablethorpe Hall--not fit to stand by one o'
them that grew strong and sweet with no fancy color, in the garden o'
the Book-in-Hand. Yours was a hand that talked as much as your lips
or face, as honest and white; and the palm all pink, and strong as
strong could be, and warmin' every thread in a man's body when he
touched it. Well, I touched your hand then, and you looked at me and
nodded, and went musin' into the fire again, not seemin' to hear our
gabble.
But, you remember--don't you?--how Jobbin took to chaffin' of Lancy
Doane, and how Faddo's tongue got sharper as the time got on, and
many a nasty word was said of coastguards and excisemen, and all that
had to do with law and gover'ment. Cuts there were at some of
Lancy's wild doings in the past, and now and then they'd turn to me,
saying what they thought would set me girdin' Lancy too. But I had
my own quarrel, and I wasn't to be baited by such numskulls. And
Lancy--that was a thing I couldn't understand--he did no more than
shrug his shoulder and call for more ale, and wish them all good
health and a hundred a year. I never thought he could ha' been so
patient-like. But there was a kind of little smile, too, on his
face, showin' he did some thinkin'; and I guessed he was bidin' his
time.
I wasn't as sharp as I might ha' been, or I'd ha' seen what he was
waitin' for, with that quiet provokin' smile on his face, and his
eyes smoulderin' like. I don't know to this day whether you wanted
to leave the room when you did, though 'twas about half after ten
o'clock, later than I ever saw you there before. But when my uncle
came in from Louth, and gave you a touch on the shoulder, and said:
"To bed wi' you, my lass," you waited for a minute longer, glancin'
round on all of us, at last lookin' steady at Lancy; and he got up
from his chair, and took off his hat to you with a way he had. You
didn't stay a second after that, but went away straight, sayin'
good-night to all of us; but Lancy was the only one on his feet.
Just as soon as the door was shut behind you, Lancy turned round to
the fire, and pushed the log with his feet in a way a man does when
he's thinkin' a bit. And Faddo gave a nasty laugh, and said:
"Theer's a dainty sitovation. Theer's Mr. Thomas Doane, outlaw and
smuggler, and theer's Mr. Lancy Doane, coastguardsman. Now, if them,
two should 'appen to meet on Lincolnshire coast, Lord, theer's a
sitovation for ye--Lord, theer's a cud to chew! Ere's one gentleman
wants to try 'is 'and at 'elpin' Prince Charlie, and when 'is 'elp
doesn't amount to anythink, what does the King on 'is throne say? He
says, "As for Thomas Doane, Esquire, aw've doone wi' 'im!" And
theer's another gentleman, Mr. Lancy Doane, Esquire. He turns pious,
and says, "Aw'm goin' for a coastguardsman!" What does the King on
his throne say? 'E says, "Theer's the man for me!" But aw says,
"Aw've doone, aw've doone wid Mr. Lancy Doane, Esquire, and be damned
to 'im." He! he! Theer's a fancy sitovation for ye. Mr. Thomas
Doane, Esquire, smuggler and outlaw, an' Mr. Lancy Doane, Esquire,
coastguardsman. Aw've doone. Ho! ho! That gits into my crop."
I tell you these things Cousin Fanny, because I'm doubtin' if you
ever heard them, or knew exactly how things stood that night. I
never was a friend of Lancy Doane, you understand, but it's only fair
that the truth be told about that quarrel, for like as not he
wouldn't speak himself, and your father was moving in and out; and, I
take my oath, I wouldn't believe Faddo and the others if they were to
swear on the Bible. Not that they didn't know the truth when they
saw it, but they did love just to let their fancy run. I'm livin'
over all the things that happened that night--livin' them over
to-day, when everything's quiet about me here, so lonesome. I wanted
to go over it all, bit by bit, and work it out in my head just as you
and I used to do the puzzle games we played in the sands. And maybe,
when you're a long way off from things you once lived, you can see
them and understand them better. Out here, where it's so lonely, and
yet so good a place to live in, I seem to get the hang o' the world
better, and why some things are, and other things aren't; and I
thought it would pull at my heart to sit down and write you a long
letter, goin' over the whole business again; but it doesn't. I
suppose I feel as a judge does when he goes over a lot of evidence,
and sums it all up for the jury. I don't seem prejudiced one way or
another. But I'm not sure that I've got all the evidence to make me
ken everything; and that's what made me bitter wild the last time
that I saw you. Maybe you hadn't anything to tell me, and maybe you
had, and maybe, if you ever write to me out here, you'll tell me if
there's anything I don't know about them days.
Well, I'll go back now to what happened when Faddo was speakin' at my
uncle's bar. Lancy Doane was standin' behind the settle, leanin' his
arms on it, and smokin' his pipe quiet. He waited patient till Faddo
had done, then he comes round the settle, puts his pipe up in the
rack between the rafters, and steps in front of Faddo. If ever the
devil was in a man's face, it looked out of Lancy Doane's that
minute. Faddo had touched him on the raw when he fetched out that
about Tom Doane. All of a sudden Lancy swings, and looks at the
clock.
"It's half-past ten, Jim Faddo," he said, "and aw've got an hour an'
a half to deal wi' you as a Lincolnshire lad. At twelve o'clock aw'm
the Gover'ment's, but till then aw'm Lancy Doane, free to strike or
free to let alone; to swallow dirt or throw it; to take a lie or give
it. And now list to me; aw'm not goin' to eat dirt, and aw'm goin'
to give you the lie, and aw'm goin' to break your neck, if I swing
for it to-morrow, Jim Faddo. And here's another thing aw'll tell
you. When the clock strikes twelve, on the best horse in the country
aw'll ride to Theddlethorpe, straight for the well that's dug you
know where, to find your smuggled stuff, and to run the irons round
your wrists. Aw'm dealin' fair wi' you that never dealt fair by no
man. You never had an open hand nor soft heart; and because you've
made money, not out o' smugglin' alone, but out o' poor devils of
smugglers that didn't know rightly to be rogues, you think to fling
your dirt where you choose. But aw'll have ye to-night as a man, and
aw'll have ye to-night as a King's officer, or aw'll go damned to
hell."
Then he steps back a bit very shiny in the face, and his eyes like
torchlights, but cool and steady. "Come on now," he says, "Jim
Faddo, away from the Book-in-Hand, and down to the beach under the
sand-hills, and we'll see man for man--though, come to think of it,
y' are no man," he said--"if ye'll have the right to say when aw'm a
King's officer that you could fling foul words in the face of Lancy
Doane. And a word more," he says; "aw wouldn't trust ye if an Angel
o' Heaven swore for ye. Take the knife from the belt behind your
back there, and throw it on the table, for you wouldn't bide by no
fair rules o' fightin'. Throw the knife on the table," he says,
comin' a step forward.
Faddo got on to his feet. He was bigger built than Lancy, and a bit
taller, and we all knew he was devilish strong in his arms. There
was a look in his face I couldn't understand. One minute I thought
it was fear, and another I thought it was daze; and maybe it was
both. But all on a' sudden something horrible cunnin' come into it,
and ugly too.
"Go to the well, then, since ye've found out all about it," he says,
"but aw've an hour and a half start o' ye, Lancy Doane."
"Ye've less than that," says Lancy back to him, "if ye go with me to
the sands first."
At that my uncle stepped in to say a word for peacemaking but Lancy
would have none of it. "Take the knife and throw it on the table,"
he said to Faddo once more, and Faddo took it out and threw it down.
"Come on, then," Faddo says, with a sneerin' laugh; "we'll see by
daybreak who has the best o' this night's work," and he steps toward
the door.
"Wait a minute," says Lancy, gettin' in front of him. "Now take the
knife from your boot. Take it," he says again, "or aw will. That's
like a man, to go to a fist-fight wi' knives. Take it," he said;
"aw'll gi' ye till aw count four, and if ye doan't take it, aw'll
take it meself. One!" he says steady and soft. "Two!" Faddo never
moved. "Three!" The silence made me sick, and the clock ticked like
hammers. "Four!" he said, and then he sprang for the boot, but
Faddo's hand went down like lightnin', too. I couldn't tell exactly
how they clinched, but once or twice I saw the light flash on' the
steel. Then they came down together, Faddo under, and when I looked
again Faddo was lying eyes starin' wide, and mouth all white with
fear, for Lancy was holding the knife-point at his throat. "Stir an
inch," says Lancy, "and aw'll pin ye to the lid o' hell."
And three minutes by the clock he knelt there on Faddo's chest, the
knife-point touching the bone in 's throat. Not one of us stirred,
but just stood lookin', and my own heart beat so hard it hurt me, and
my uncle steadyin' himself against the dresser. At last Lancy threw
the knife away into the fire.
"Coward!" he said. "A man would ha' taken the knife. Did you think
aw was goin' to gie my neck to the noose just to put your knife to
proper use? But don't stir till aw gie you the word, or aw'll choke
the breath o' life out o' ye." At that Faddo sprung to clinch Lancy's
arms, Lancy's fingers caught him in the throat, and I thought surely
Faddo was gone, for his tongue stood out a finger-length, and he was
black in the face.
"For God's sake, Lancy," said my uncle, steppin' forward, "let him
go."
At that Lancy said, "He's right enough. It's not the first time
aw've choked a coward. Throw cold water on him and gi' 'im brandy."
Sure enough, he wasn't dead. Lancy stood there watchin' us while we
fetched Faddo back, and I tell you, that was a narrow squeak for him.
When he got his senses again, and was sittin' there lookin' as if
he'd been hung and brought back to life, Lancy says to him: "There,
Jim Faddo, aw've done wi' you as a man, and at twelve o'clock aw'll
begin wi' ye as King's officer." And at that, with a good-night to
my uncle and all of us, he turns on his heels and leaves the
Book-in-Hand.
I tell you, Cousin Fanny, though I'd been ripe for quarrel wi' Lancy
Doane myself that night, I could ha' took his hand like a brother,
for I never saw a man deal fairer wi' a scoundrel than he did wi' Jim
Faddo. You see it wasn't what Faddo said about himself that made
Lancy wild, but that about his brother Tom; and a man doesn't like
his brother spoken ill of by dirt like Faddo, be it true or false.
And of Lancy's brother I'm goin' to write further on in this letter,
for I doubt that you know all I know about him, and the rest of what
happened that night and afterwards.
* * * * * * * *
Dear Cousin Fanny--I canna write all I set out to, for word come to
me, just as I wrote the last sentence above, that the ship was to
leave port three days sooner than was fixed for when I began. I have
been rare and busy since then, and I have no time to write more. And
so 'twill be another year before you get a word from me; but I hope
that when this letter comes you'll write one back to me by the ship
that sails next summer from London. The summer's short and the
winter's long here, Cousin Fanny, and there's more snow than grass;
and there's more flowers in a week in Mablethorpe than in a whole
year here. But, lass, the sun shines always, and my heart keeps warm
in thinkin' of you, and I ask you to forgive me for any harsh word I
ever spoke, not forgettin' that last night when I left you on the
sands, and stole away like a thief across the sea. I'm going to tell
you the whole truth in my next letter, but I'd like you to forgive me
before you know it all, for 'tis a right lonely and distant land,
this, and who can tell what may come to pass in twice a twelvemonth!
Maybe a prayer on lips like mine doesn't seem in place, for I've not
lived as parson says man ought to live, but I think the Lord will
have no worse thought o' me when I say, God bless thee, lass, and
keep thee safe as any flower in His garden that He watereth with His
own hand. Write to me, lass: I love thee still, I do love thee.
DICK ORRY.
II
THE BOOK-IN-HAND INN,
MABLETHORPE, LINCOLNSHIRE.
_May-Day_, 1749.
Dear Cousin Dick--I think I have not been so glad in many years as
when I got your letter last Guy Fawkes Day. I was coming from the
church where the parson preached on plots and treasons, and obedience
to the King, when I saw the old postman coming down the road. I made
quickly to him, I know not why, for I had not thought to hear from
you, and before I reached him he held up his hand, showing me the
stout packet which brought me news of you. I hurried with it to the
inn, and went straight to my room and sat down by the window, where I
used to watch for your coming with the fishing fleet, down the sea
from the Dogger Bank. I was only a girl, a young girl, then, and the
Dogger Bank was, to my mind, as far off as that place you call York
Factory, in Hudson's Bay, is to me now. And yet I did not know how
very far it was until our schoolmaster showed me on a globe how few
days' sail it is to the Dogger Bank, and how many to York Factory.
But I will tell you of my reading of your letter, and of what I
thought. But first I must go back a little. When you went away that
wild, dark night, with bitter words on your lips to me, Cousin Dick,
I thought I should never feel the same again. You did not know it,
but I was bearing the misery of your trouble and of another's also,
and of my own as well; and so I said over and over again: Oh, why
will men be hard on women? Why do they look for them to be iron like
themselves, bearing double burdens as most women do? But afterward,
I settled to a quietness which I would not have you think was
happiness, for I have given up thought of that. Nor would I have you
think me bearing trouble sweetly, for sometimes I was most hard and
stubborn. But I lived on in a sort of stillness till that morning
when, sitting by my window, I read all you had written to me. And
first of all, I must tell you how my heart was touched at your words
about our childhood together. I had not thought it lay so deep in
your mind, Cousin Dick. It always stays in mine; but then, women
have more memories than men. The story of that night I knew; but
never fully as you have told it to me in your letter. Of what
happened after Lancy Doane left the inn, of which you have not
written, but promised the writing in your next letter, I think I know
as well as yourself. Nay, more, Cousin Dick. There are some matters
concerning what followed that night and after, which I know, and you
do not know. But you have guessed there was something which I did
not tell you, and so there was. And I will tell you of them now.
But I will take up the thread of the story where you dropped it, and
reel it out.
You left the inn soon after Lancy Doane, and James Faddo went then,
too, riding hard for Theddlethorpe, for he knew that in less than an
hour the coastguards would be rifling the hiding-places of his
smuggled stuff. You did not take a horse, but, getting a musket, you
walked the sands hard to Theddlethorpe.
I know it all, though you did not tell me, Cousin Dick. You had no
purpose in going, save to see the end of a wretched quarrel and a
smuggler's ill-scheme. You carried a musket for your own safety, not
with any purpose. It was a day of weight in your own life, for on
one side you had an offer from the Earl Fitzwilliam to serve on his
estate; and on the other to take a share in a little fleet of fishing
smacks, of which my father was part owner. I think you know to which
side I inclined, but that now is neither here nor there; and, though
you did not tell me, as you went along the shore you were more intent
on handing back and forth in your mind your own affairs, than of what
should happen at Theddlethorpe. And so you did not hurry as you
went, and, as things happened, you came to Faddo's house almost at
the same moment with Lancy Doane and two other mounted coastguards.
You stood in the shadow while they knocked at Faddo's door. You were
so near, you could see the hateful look in his face. You were
surprised he did not try to stand the coastguards off. You saw him,
at their bidding, take a lantern, and march with them to a shed
standing off a little from the house, nearer to the shore. Going a
round-about swiftly, you came to the shed first, and posted yourself
at the little window on the sea-side. You saw them enter with the
lantern, saw them shift a cider press, uncover the floor, and there
beneath, in a dry well, were barrels upon barrels of spirits, and
crouched among them was a man whom you all knew at once--Lancy's
brother, Tom. That, Cousin Dick, was Jim Faddo's revenge. Tom Doane
had got refuge with him till he should reach his brother, not knowing
Lancy was to be coastguard. Faddo, coming back from Mablethorpe,
told Tom the coastguards were to raid him that night; and he made him
hide in this safe place, as he called it, knowing that Lancy would
make for it.
For a minute after Tom was found no man stirred. Tom was quick of
brain and wit--would it had always been put to good purposes!--and
saw at once Faddo's treachery. Like winking he fired at the traitor,
who was almost as quick to return the fire. What made you do it I
know not, unless it was you hated treachery; but, sliding in at the
open door behind the coastguards, you snatched the lantern from the
hands of one, threw it out of the open door, and, thrusting them
aside, called for Tom to follow you. He sprang toward you over
Faddo's body, even as you threw the lantern, and catching his arm,
you ran with him toward the dyke.
"Ready for a great jump!" you said; "your life hangs on it." He was
even longer of leg than you. "Is it a dyke?" he whispered, as the
shots from three muskets rang after you. "A dyke. When I count
three, jump," you answered. I have read somewhere of the great leap
that one Don Alvarado, a Spaniard, made in Mexico, but surely never
was a greater leap than you two made that night, landing safely on
the other side, and making for the sea-shore. None of the
coastguardsmen, not even Lancy, could make the leap, for he was sick
and trembling, though he had fired upon his own brother. And so they
made for the bridge some distance above, just as the faint moon
slipped behind a cloud and hid you from their sight.
That is no country to hide in, as you know well--no caves, or hills,
or mazy coombes--just a wide, flat, reedy place, broken by open
wolds. The only refuge for both now was the sea. 'Twas a wild run
you two made, side by side, down that shore, keeping close within the
gloom of the sand-hills, the coastguards coming after, pressing you
closer than they thought at the time, for Tom Doane had been wounded
in the leg. But Lancy sent one back for the horses, he and the other
coming on; and so, there you were, two and two. 'Twas a cruel task
for Lancy that night, enough to turn a man's hair gray. But duty was
duty, though those two lads were more to each other than most men
ever are. You know how it ended. But I want to go all over it just
to show you that I understand. You were within a mile of
Mablethorpe, when you saw a little fishing smack come riding in, and
you made straight for it. Who should be in the smack but Solby, the
canting Baptist, who was no friend to you, or uncle, or any of us.
You had not time for bargaining or coaxing, and so, at the musket's
mouth, you drove him from the boat, and pushed it out just as Lancy
and his men came riding up. Your sail was up, and you turned the
lugger to the wind in as little time as could be, but the
coastguardsmen rode after you, calling you to give in. No man will
ever know the bitter trouble in Lancy's heart when he gave the order
to fire on you, though he did not fire himself. And you--do I not
know, Cousin Dick, what you did? Tom Doane was not the man to fire
at the three dark figures riding you down, not knowing which was his
brother. But you, you understood that; and you were in, you said to
yourself, and you'd play the game out, come what would. You raised
your musket and drew upon a figure. At that moment a coastguard's
musket blazed, and you saw the man you had drawn on was Lancy Doane.
You lowered your musket, and as you did a ball struck you on the
wrist.
Oh, I have thanked God a hundred times, dear Cousin Dick, that you
fired no shot that night, but only helped a hunted, miserable man
away, for you did get free. Just in the nick of time your sail
caught the wind bravely, and you steered for the open sea. Three
days from that, Tom Doane was safe at the Hague, and you were on your
way back to Lincolnshire. You came by a fishing boat to Saltfleet
Haven, and made your way down the coast toward Mablethorpe. Passing
Theddlethorpe, you went up to Faddo's house, and, looking through the
window, you saw Faddo, not dead, but being cared for by his wife.
Then you came on to Mablethorpe, and standing under my window at the
very moment when I was on my knees praying for the safety of those
who traveled by sea, you whistled, like a quail from the garden
below--the old signal. Oh, how my heart stood still a moment, and
then leaped, for I knew it was you. I went down to the garden, and
there you were. Oh, I was glad to see you, Cousin Dick!
You remember how I let you take me in your arms for an instant, and
then I asked if he was safe. And when you told me that he was, I
burst into tears, and I asked you many questions about him. And you
answered them quickly, and then would have taken me in your arms
again. But I would not let you, for then I knew--I knew that you
loved me, and, oh, a dreadful feeling came into my heart, and I drew
back, and could have sunk upon the ground in misery, but that there
came a thought of your safety. _He_ was safe, but you--you were
here, where reward was set for you. I begged you to come into the
house, that I might hide you there, but you would not. You had come
for one thing, you said, and only one. An hour or two, and then you
must be gone for London. And so you urged me to the beach. I was
afraid we might be seen, but you led me away from the cottages near
to the little bridge which crosses the dyke. By that way we came to
the sands, as we thought unnoted. But no, who should it be to see us
but that canting Baptist, Solby! And so the alarm was given. You
had come, dear Cousin Dick, to ask me one thing--if I loved you? and
if, should you ever be free to come back, I would be your wife? I
did not answer you; I could not answer you; and, when you pressed me,
I begged you to have pity on me, and not to speak of it. You thought
I was not brave enough to love a man open to the law. As if--as if I
knew not that what you did came out of a generous, reckless heart!
And on my knees--oh, on my knees--I ought to have thanked you for it.
But I knew not what to say; my lips were closed. And just then shots
were fired, and we saw the coastguards' lights. Then came Lancy
Doane stumbling down the banks, and our parting--our parting. Your
bitter laugh as you left me has rung in my ears ever since.
Do not think we have been idle here in your cause, for I myself went
to Earl Fitzwilliam and told him the whole story, and how you had
come to help Tom Doane that night. How do I know of it all? Because
I have seen a letter from Tom Doane. Well, the Earl promised to lay
your case before the King himself, and to speak for you with good
eager entreaty. And so, it may be, by next time I write, there will
go good news to you, and--will you then come back, dear Cousin Dick?
And I now want to tell you what I know, and what you do not know.
Tom Doane had a wife in Mablethorpe. He married her when she was but
sixteen--a child. But she was afraid of her father's anger, and her
husband soon after went abroad, became one of Prince Charlie's men,
and she's never seen him since. She never really loved him, but she
never forgot that she was his wife; and she always dreaded his coming
back; as well she might, for you see what happened when he did come.
I pitied her, dear Cousin Dick, with all my heart; and when Tom Doane
died on the field of battle in Holland last year, I wept with her and
prayed for her. And you would have wept too, man though you are, if
you had seen how grateful she was that he died in honorable fighting,
and not in a smuggler's cave at Theddlethorpe. She blessed you for
that, and she never ceases to work with me for the King's pardon for
you.
There is no more to say now, dear Cousin Dick, save that I would have
you know I think of you with great desire of heart for your
well-being, and I pray God for your safe return some day to the good
country which, pardoning you, will cast you out no more.
I am, dear Cousin Dick,
Thy most affectionate Cousin,
FANNY.
P.S.--Dear Dick, my heart bursts for joy. Enclosed here is thy
pardon, sent by the good Earl Fitzwilliam last night. I could serve
him on my knees forever. Dick, she that was Tom Doane's wife, she
loves thee. Wilt thou not come back to her? In truth, she always
loved thee. She was thy cousin; she is thy Fanny. Now thou knowest
all.
The Smugglers of the Clone
BY S. R. CROCKETT
"_Rise, Robin, rise! The partans are on the sands!_"
The crying at our little window raised me out of a sound sleep, for I
had been out seeing the Myreside lasses late the night before, and
was far from being wake-rife at two by the clock on a February
morning.
It was the first time the summons had come to me, for I was then but
young. Hitherto it was my brother John who had answered the raising
word of the free-traders spoken at the window. But now John had a
farm-steading of his own, thanks to Sir William Maxwell and to my
father's siller that had paid for the stock.
So with all speed I did my clothes upon me, with much eagerness and a
beating heart--as who would not, when, for the first time, he has the
privilege of man? As I went out to the barn I could hear my mother
(with whom I was ever a favorite) praying for me.
"Save the laddie--save the laddie!" she said over and over.
And I think my father prayed too; but, as I went, he also cried to me
counsels.
"Be sure you keep up the grappling chains--dinna let them clatter
till ye hae the stuff weel up the hill. The Lord keep ye! Be a guid
lad an' ride honestly. Gin ye see Sir William, keep your head doon,
an' gae by withoot lookin'. He's a magistrate, ye ken. But he'll
no' see you, gin ye dinna see him. Leave twa ankers a-piece o'
brandy an' rum at our ain dyke back. An' abune a', the Lord be wi'
ye, an' bring ye safe back to your sorrowing parents!"
So, with pride, I did the harness graith upon the sonsy back of Brown
Bess--the pad before where I was to sit--the lingtow and the hooked
chains behind. I had a cutlass, a jockteleg (or smuggler's
sheaf-knife), and a pair of brass-mounted pistols ready swung in my
leathern belt. Faith, but I wish Bell of the Mains could have seen
me then, ready to ride forth with the light-horsemen. She would
never scorn me more for a lingle-backed callant, I 'se warrant.
"Haste ye, Robin! Heard ye no' that the partans are on the sands?"
It was Geordie of the Clone who cried to me. He meant the
free-traders from the Isle, rolling the barrels ashore.
"I am e'en, as ready as ye are yoursel'!" I gave him answer, for I
was not going to let him boast himself prideful all, because he had
ridden out with them once or twice before. Besides, his horse and
accoutrement were not one half so good as mine. For my father was an
honest and well-considered man, and in good standing with the laird
and the minister, so that he could afford to do things handsomely.
We made haste to ride along the heuchs, which are very high, steep,
and rocky at this part of the coast.
And at every loaning-end we heard the clinking of the smugglers
chains, and I thought the sound a livening and a merry one.
"A fair guid-e'en and a full tide, young Airyolan!" cried one to me
as we came by Killantrae. And I own the name was sweet to my ears.
For it was the custom to call men by the names of their farms, and
Airyolan was my father's name by rights. But mine for that night,
because in my hands was the honor of the house.
Ere we got down to the Clone we could hear, all about in the
darkness, athwart and athwart, the clattering of chains, the stir of
many horses, and the voices of men.
Black Taggart was in with his lugger, the "Sea Pyet," and such a
cargo as the Clone men had never run--so ran the talk on every side.
There was not a sleeping wife nor yet a man left indoors in all the
parish of Mochrum, except only the laird and the minister.
By the time that we got down by the shore, there was quite a company
of the Men of the Fells, as the shore men called us--all dour, swack,
determined fellows.
"Here come the hill nowt!" said one of the village men, as he caught
sight of us. I knew him for a limber-tongued, ill-livered loon from
the Port, so I delivered him a blow fair and solid between the eyes,
and he dropped without a gurgle. This was to learn him how to speak
to innocent harmless strangers.
Then there was a turmoil indeed to speak about, for all the men of
the laigh shore crowded round us, and knives were drawn. But I
cried, "Corwald, Mochrum, Chippermore, here to me!" And all the
stout lads came about me.
Nevertheless, it looked black for a moment, as the shore men waved
their torches in our faces, and yelled fiercely at us to put us down
by fear.
Then a tall young man on a horse rode straight at the crowd which had
gathered about the loon I had felled. He had a mask over his face
which sometimes slipped awry. But, in spite of the disguise, he
seemed perfectly well known to all there.
"What have we here?" he asked, in a voice of questioning that had
also the power of command in it.
"'Tis these Men of the Fells that have stricken down Jock Webster of
the Port, Maister William!" said one of the crowd.
Then I knew the laird's son, and did my duty to him, telling him of
my provocation, and how I had only given the rascal strength of arm.
"And right well you did," said Maister William, "for these dogs would
swatter in the good brandy, but never help to carry it to the caves,
nor bring the well-graithed horses to the shore-side! Carry the loon
away, and stap him into a heather hole till he come to."
So that was all the comfort they got for their tale-telling. "And
you, young Airyolan," said Maister William, "that are so ready with
your strength of arm--there is even a job that you may do. Muckle
Jock, the Preventive man, rides to-night from Isle of Whithorn, where
he has been warning the revenue cutter. Do you meet him and keep him
from doing himself an injury."
"And where shall I meet him, Maister William?" I asked of the young
laird.
"Oh, somewhere on the heuch-taps," said he, carelessly; "and see,
swing these on your horse and leave them at Myrtoun on the by-going."
He called a man with a torch, who came and stood over me, while I
laid on Brown Bess a pair of small casks of some fine liqueur, of
which more than ordinary care was to be taken, and also a few
packages of soft goods, silks and laces as I deemed.
"Take these to the Loch Yett, and ca' Sandy Fergus to stow them for
ye. Syne do your work with the Exciseman as he comes hame. Gar him
bide where he is till the sun be at its highest to-morrow. And a
double share o' the plunder shall be lyin' in the hole at a back of
the dyke at Airyolan when ye ride hame the morn at e'en."
So I bade him a good-night, and rode my ways over the fields, and
across many burns to Myrtoun. As I went I looked back, and there,
below me, was a strange sight,--all the little harbor of the Clone
lighted up, a hurrying of men down to the shore, the flickering of
torches, and the lappering of the sea making a stir of gallant life
that set the blood leaping along the veins. It was, indeed, I
thought, worth while living to be a free-trader. Far out, I could
see the dark spars of the lugger "Sea Pyet," and hear the casks and
ankers dumping into the boats alongside.
Then I began to bethink me that I had a more desperate ploy than any
of them that were down there, for they were many, and I was but one.
Moreover, easily, as young Master William might say, "Meet Muckle
Jock, and keep him till the morn at noon!" the matter was not so easy
as supping one's porridge.
Now, I had never seen the Exciseman, but my brother had played at the
cudgels with Jock before this. So I knew more of him than to suppose
that he would bide for the bidding of one man when in the way of his
duty.
But when the young laird went away he slipped me a small, heavy
packet.
"Half for you and half for the gauger, gin he hears reason," he said.
By the weight and the jingle I judged it to be yellow Geordies, the
best thing that the wee, wee German lairdie ever sent to Tory
Mochrun. And not too plenty there, either! Though since the Clone
folk did so well with the clean-run smuggling from the blessed Isle
of Man, it is true that there are more of the Geordies than there
used to be.
So I rode round by the back of the White Loch, for Sir William had a
habit of daunering, over by the Airlour and Barsalloch, and in my
present ride I had no desire to meet with him.
Yet, as fate would have it, I was not to win clear that night. I had
not ridden more than half-way round the loch when Brown Bess went
floundering into a moss-hole, which are indeed more plenty than paved
roads in that quarter. And what with the weight of the pack, and her
struggling, we threatened to go down altogether. When I thought of
what my father would say, if I went home with my finger in my mouth,
and neither Brown Bess nor yet a penny's-worth to be the value of
her, I was fairly a-sweat with fear. I cried aloud for help, for
there were cot-houses near by. And, as I had hoped, in a little a
man came out of the shadows of the willow bushes.
"What want ye, yochel?" said he, in a mightily lofty tone.
"I'll 'yochel' ye, gin I had time. Pu' on that rope," I said, for my
spirit was disturbed by the accident. Also, as I have said, I took
ill-talk from no man.
So, with a little laugh, the man laid hold of the rope, and pulled
his best, while I took off what of the packages I could reach, ever
keeping my own feet moving, to clear the sticky glaur of the bog-hole
from them.
"Tak that hook out, and ease doon the cask, man!" I cried to him, for
I was in desperation; "I'll gie ye a heartsome gill, even though the
stuff be Sir William's!"
And the man laughed again, being, as I judged, well enough pleased.
For all that service yet was I not pleased to be called "yochel."
But, in the meantime, I saw not how, at the moment, I could begin to
cuff and clout one that was helping my horse and stuff out of a
bog-hole. Yet I resolved somehow to be even with him, for, though a
peaceable man, I never could abide the calling of ill names.
"Whither gang ye?" said he.
"To the Muckle Hoose o' Myrtoun," said I, "and gang you wi' me, my
man; and gie me a hand doon wi' the stuff, for I hae nae stomach for
mair warsling in bog-holes. And wha kens but that auld thrawn Turk,
Sir William, may happen on us?"
"Ken ye Sir William Maxwell?" said the man.
"Na," said I. "I never so muckle as set e'en on the auld wretch.
But I had sax hard days' wark cutting doon bushes, and makin' a road
for his daftlike carriage wi' wheels, for him to ride in to Mochrum
Kirk."
"Saw ye him never there?" said the man, as I strapped the packages on
again.
"Na," said I, "my faither is a Cameronian, and gangs to nae Kirk
hereaboots."
"He has gi'en his son a bonny upbringing, then!" quoth the man.
Now this made me mainly angry, for I cannot bide that folk should
meddle with my folk. Though as far as I am concerned myself I am a
peaceable man.
"Hear ye," said I, "I ken no wha ye are that speers so mony
questions. Ye may be the de'il himsel', or ye may be the enemy o'
Mochrum, the blackavised Commodore frae Glasserton. But, I can
warrant ye that ye'll no mell and claw unyeuked with Robin o'
Airyolan. Hear ye that, my man, and keep a civil tongue within your
ill-lookin' cheek, gin ye want to gang hame in the morning wi' an
uncracked croun!"
The man said no more, and by his gait I judged him to be some serving
man. For, as far as the light served me, he was not so well put on
as myself. Yet there was a kind of neatness about the creature that
showed him to be no out-door man either.
However, he accompanied me willingly enough till we came to the
Muckle House of Myrtoun. For I think that he was feared of his head
at my words. And indeed it would not have taken the kittling of a
flea to have garred me draw a staff over his crown. For there is
nothing that angers a Galloway man more than an ignorant, Lipsetting
town's body, putting in his gab when he desires to live peaceable.
So, when we came to the back entrance, I said to him: "Hear ye to
this. Ye are to make no noise, my mannie, but gie me a lift doon wi'
thae barrels cannily. For that dour old tod, the laird, is to ken
naething aboot this. Only Miss Peggy and Maister William, they ken.
'Deed, it was young William himsel' that sent me on this errand."
So with that the mannie gave a kind of laugh, and helped me down with
the ankers far better than I could have expected. We rolled them
into a shed at the back of the stables, and covered them up snug with
some straw and some old heather thatching.
"Ay, my lad," says I to him, "for a' your douce speech and fair words
I can see that ye hae been at this job afore!"
"Well, it is true," he said, "that I hae rolled a barrel or two in my
time."
Then, in the waft of an eye I knew who he was. I set him down for
Muckle Jock, the Excise officer, that had never gone to the
Glasserton at all, but had been lurking there in the moss, waiting to
deceive honest men. I knew that I needed to be wary with him, for he
was, as I had heard, a sturdy carl, and had won the last throw at the
Stoneykirk wrestling. But all the men of the Fellside have an
excellent opinion of themselves, and I thought I was good for any man
of the size of this one.
So said I to him: "Noo, chiel, ye ken we are no' juist carryin'
barrels o' spring water at this time o' nicht to pleasure King
George. Hearken ye: we are in danger of being laid by the heels in
the jail of Wigton gin the black lawyer corbies get us. Noo, there's
a Preventive man that is crawling and spying ower by on the heights
o' Physgill. Ye maun e'en come wi' me an' help to keep him oot o'
hairm's way. For it wad not be for his guid that he should gang doon
to the port this nicht!"
The man that I took to be the ganger hummed and hawed a while, till I
had enough of his talk and unstable ways.
"No back-and-forrit ways wi' Robin," said I. "Will ye come and help
to catch the King's officer, or will ye not?"
"No' a foot will I go," says he. "I have been a King's officer,
myself!"
Whereupon I laid a pistol to his ear, for I was in some heat.
"Gin you war King Geordie himsel', aye, or Cumberland either, ye
shall come wi' me and help to catch the gauger," said I.
For I bethought me that it would be a bonny ploy, and one long to be
talked about in these parts, thus to lay by the heels the Exciseman
and make him tramp to Glasserton to kidnap himself.
The man with the bandy legs was taking a while to consider, so I said
to him: "She is a guid pistol and new primed!"
"I'll come wi' ye!" said he.
So I set him first on the road, and left my horse in the stables of
Myrtoun. It was the gloam of the morning when we got to the turn of
the path by which, if he were to come at all, the new gauger would
ride from Glasserton. And lo! as if we had set a tryst, there he was
coming over the heathery braes at a brisk trot. So I covered him
with my pistol, and took his horse by the reins, thinking no more of
the other man I had taken for the gauger before.
"Dismount, my lad," I said. "Ye dinna ken me, but I ken you. Come
here, my brisk landlouper, and help to haud him!"
I saw the stranger who had come with me sneaking off, but with my
other pistol I brought him to a stand. So together we got the gauger
into a little thicket or planting. And here, willing or unwilling,
we kept him all day, till we were sure that the stuff would all be
run, and the long trains of honest smugglers on good horses far on
their way to the towns of the north.
Then very conscientiously I counted out the half of the tale of
golden guineas Master William had given me, and put them into the
pocket of the ganger's coat.
"Gin ye are a good, still-tongued kind of cattle, there is more of
that kind of yellow oats where these came from," said I. "But lie ye
here snug as a paitrick for an hour yet by the clock, lest even yet
ye should come to harm!"
So there we left him, not very sorely angered, for all he had posed
as so efficient and zealous a King's officer.
"Now," said I to the man that had helped me, "I promised ye half o'
Maister William's guineas, that he bade me keep, for I allow that it
micht hae been a different job but for your help. And here they are.
Ye shall never say that Robin of Airyolan roguit ony man--even a
feckless toon's birkie wi' bandy legs!"
The man laughed and took the siller, saying, "Thank'ee!" with an
arrogant air as if he handled bags of them every day. But,
nevertheless, he took them, and I parted from him, wishing him well,
which was more than he did to me. But I know how to use civility
upon occasion.
When I reached home I told my father, and described the man I had
met. But he could make no guess at him. Nor had I any myself till
the next rent day, when my father, having a lame leg where the colt
had kicked him, sent me down to pay the owing. The factor I knew
well, but I had my money in hand and little I cared for him. But
what was my astonishment to find, sitting at the table with him, the
very same man who had helped me to lay the Exciseman by the heels.
But now, I thought, there was a strangely different air about him.
And what astonished me more, it was this man, and not the factor, who
spoke first to me.
"Aye, young Robin of Airyolan, and are you here? Ye are a chiel with
birr and smeddum! There are the bones of a man in ye! Hae ye
settled with the gauger for shackling him by the hill of Physgill?"
Now, as I have said, I thole snash from no man, and I gave him the
word back sharply.
"Hae ye settled wi' him yoursel', sir? For it was you that tied the
tow rope!"
My adversary laughed, and looked not at all ill-pleased.
He pointed to the five gold Georges on the tables.
"Hark ye, Robin of Airyolan, these are the five guineas ye gied to me
like an honest man. I'll forgie ye for layin' the pistol to my lug,
for after all ye are some credit to the land that fed ye. Gin ye
promise to wed a decent lass, I'll e'en gie ye a farm o' your ain.
And as sure as my name is Sir William Maxwell, ye shall sit your
lifetime rent free, for the de'il's errand that ye took me on the
nicht of the brandy-running at the Clone."
I could have sunken through the floor when I heard that it was Sir
William himself--whom, because he had so recently returned from
foreign parts after a sojourn of many years, I had never before seen.
Then both the factor and the laird laughed heartily at my
discomfiture.
"Ken ye o' ony lass that wad tak' up wi' ye, Robin?" said Sir William.
"Half a dozen o' them, my lord," said I. "Lassies are neither ill to
seek nor hard to find when Robin of Airyolan gangs a-cortin'!"
"Losh preserve us!" cried the laird, slapping his thigh, "but I
mysel' never sallied forth to woo a lass so blithely confident!"
I said nothing, but dusted my knee-breeks. For the laird was no very
good-looking man, being gray as a badger.
"An' mind ye maun see to it that the bairns are a' loons, and as
staunch and stark as yoursel'!" said the factor.
"A man can but do his best," answered I, very modestly as I thought.
For I never can tell why it is that the folk will always say that I
have a good opinion of myself. But neither, on the other hand, can I
tell why I should not.
"That There Mason"
BY W. CLARK RUSSELL
I was in Ramsgate, in the pier-yard, and noticed the figure of a
boatman leaning against the wall of a building used by the Trinity
people. I stepped close, and looked at him. He was a little man,
curved; his hands were buried to the knuckles' end in his breeches
pockets; he wore a yellow sou'wester, and under it was a sour,
sneering, wicked face. His eyes were damp and sunk, and seemed to
discharge a thin liquor like pale ale, and he would not pull out his
hands to wipe them.
"What's your name?" said I.
He looked at me slowly, beginning at my waistcoat, and answered:
"What's that got to do with you?"
"Do you want a job?"
"What sorter job?" he replied, continuing to lean against the wall,
without any motion of his body, merely looking at me.
"The job of answering a civil question with a civil answer," said I.
He turned his head, and gazed at the sea without replying.
"What's that obelisk?" said I.
His head came back to its bearings, and he answered: "What's what?"
"That thing in granite, yonder; that tall stone spike. What is it?"
"Can yer read?"
"Better than you, I expect," I answered.
"Then why don't you go and find out for yourself?" said he, uttering
a small, hideous laugh.
"I rather fancy," said I, "that that spike was erected to commemorate
the landing of George IV. He was kind enough to condescend to land
at Ramsgate. Wasn't that good of him, Tommy? Blown here, maybe,
vomiting, to the pier-head, and rejoicing, under his waistcoats, to
get ashore anywhere and anyhow. And the snobs of Ramsgate go to the
expense of erecting that unwholesome and shocking memorial of so
abject a trifle as the landing of a fat immoral man at this port on
his way to London. Why don't you, and the like of you, level
it--knock the blamed thing into blocks of stone, and build a house
with them for a good man to live in?"
His eyes had come to the surface; they were running harder than ever.
He was in a rage.
"Look here," said he; "I don't know who y' are, but don't yer like
that there pillar?"
"No," I answered.
"Then why don't yer go home? There's nothen' to keep yer 'ere, I
'ope? Plenty of trains to all parts, and I'll carry yer bag for
nothen', allowin' you've got one, only for the satisfaction of seein'
the last of yer."
I told him I would remember that, and, bursting into uncontrollable
laughter at his peculiarly ugly, wicked face, I walked off, scarce
knowing but that I should feel the blow of "'arf a brick" in the back
of my head as I went.
I met a boatman with whom I had gone fishing on some occasions.
"Thomas," said I, pointing to the leaning figure, "who is that queer
little chap?"
"Jimmie Mason," replied Thomas, with a half-glance at the wall-scab,
then turning his back upon it.
"Has he ever been hung?" said I.
"Don't think he could have been quite old enough for it," he replied,
turning again to look at the little man. "They cut a man down from
the gibbet on the sand hills yonder," said he, pointing in the
direction of Deal, "when my father was a boy, and he used to say
that, when the man got sprung, he'd relate, in beautiful language,
how he felt when he was turned off."
"A dose of turning-off would do that gent in the sou'-wester a great
deal of good," said I. "He's a sort of man, you know, to murder you
when you're out fishing with him. He's a sort of man to stab you in
the back with a great clasp knife, and drag your body into the empty
house, which never lets ever after."
"Old Jim Mason's just the worst-tempered man on the coast. His heart
was turned black by a disappointment," said Thomas.
"Love?" said I.
"Why, not exactly love," he replied; "it was more in the hovelling
line."
"Is it a good yarn?" I asked. "If so, I'll stand two drinks; a pint
for you and a half-pint for me."
"It might be worth recording," said Thomas, taking the time occupied
by the harbor clock in striking twelve to reflect. "Anyways, pint or
no pint, here it is," and, folding his arms, this intelligent
"longshoreman" started thus:
"Some years ago, a gemman and a lady went out for a sail, and, as is
not always customary in these 'ere parts--though we've got some thick
heads among us, I can tell you,--they were capsized. The gemman was
drowned, the lady and the boatman saved, and the boat was picked up
and towed in--there she lies, "The 'Arbour Bud."
"The widder, as was natural, was in dreadful grief; and, in a day or
two, police bills was pasted about the walls, offering a reward of
50_l._ to any one who should recover the body. That there Mason, as
you see a-leaning agin that house, was just the party for a job of
this sort. He called 'em soft jobs. He was one of them men as would
walk about the rocks and sands arter a breeze of wind, hunting for
whatever he might find--be it a corpse that had come ashore to keep
him in good spirits, or the 'arf of a shoe. Him and Sam Bowler was
a-huntin' arter jewelery down among the rocks one day, and that there
Mason picked up a gold ring. He offered it to Bowler, who gave him
five shullens for it, and that night, at the sign of the 'Welcome
'Arp,' that there Mason swallowed some of his front teeth, and got
both eyes plugged, for Bowler, who weighs fourteen stun, had
discovered that the ring was brass.
"Well, that there Mason takes it into his head to go for a walk one
day arter the bills about the body had been pasted on the walls. He
walked in the direction of Broadstairs, and, comin' to the coastguard
station, he falls in with one of the men, a sort of relation of his.
They got yarning. The coastguard had a big telescope under his arm.
That there Mason asked leave to have a look, and he levels the glass
and begins to work about with it. The line of the Good'in Sands was
as plain as the nose on his face. It was low water, the whole
stretch of the shoal was visible, and it was a clear bright afternoon.
"'What's taken yer heye?' says the coastguard presently.
"'Nothen, oh, nothen," answered that there Mason. 'Sands show
oncommon plain to-day.'
"He handed back the glass to the coastguard, and then, instead of
continuing his walk, he returned to this here yard, and got into his
boat and pulled away out of the harbor.
"Now what do yer think he had seen in that telescope? A dead man
stranded on the Good'in Sands. There could be no mistake. That
there Mason belonged to the cocksure lot; _he_ never made a blunder
in all his life. It mightn't be the body as was advertised for, but,
if it was, 'twas a fifty-pound job; and that there Mason, without a
word, pulled out o' 'arbor feelin', I daresay, as if he'd got the
gold in his pocket, and the heavens was beginnin' to smile upon him.
"'Tis a long pull to the Good'ins, tide or no tide. None took any
notice of his goin' out. There was some boats a-fishin' in Pegwell
Bay, and if any man looked at that there Mason a-rowing out to sea,
he'd expect to see him bring up and drop a line over the side. He
rowed and rowed. The body lay upon the edge of the Sand, a long
distance away from the Gull lightship. He rowed and rowed. By and
by, standin' up, he pulls out a bit of a pocket-glass, and then
discovers that what he'd taken to be a man's dead body was nothen but
a small balk of timber, black with black seaweed, stretched out on
either side, so that at a distance it looked exactly like a corpse on
its back with its arms out.
"That there Mason might ha' burst himself with passion if he hadn't
been too dead beat with rowing. Even in them times he wasn't no
chicken. Well, thinks he to himself, since I've had all this here
labor merely to view a balk of timber, I may as well step ashore for
a spell of rest, and take a short cruise round, for who knows what I
might find? So what does the joker do but head his boat right in for
the sand, and then he jumps ashore. He made his boat fast to the
balk of timber. It was arter five, and the sun westerin' fast. He
drives his 'ands deep into his pockets, and slowly meanders, always
a-looking. What was these to find? He couldn't tell. There was
expectation, yer see, and that was a sort of joy to the 'eart of that
there Mason. Y'u'd hardly think it of a boatman, but it's true:
whilst that bally idiot was a-wandering about them sands searching
for whatever there might be, his boat, giving a tug at her painter,
frees the rope and drifts away on the tide, with that there man as
you are now a-looking at walking about the sands, his 'ands buried
deep and his eyes fixed, dreaming of lighting upon a sovereign or a
gold chain--you can never tell what passes in such an 'ead. Bym-by
he turns to look for his boat, and lo and be'old she's gone. There
she was half a mile off, quietly floating away to the norr'ard. The
sun was beginning to sink low; the night was coming along. The
people aboard the Gull lightship didn't see him or take any notice;
what was that there Mason going to do? There was no wreck to shelter
him. It might be that at Ramsgate they'd see a lonely man a-walking
about, and send a boat; but, as I've said, dusk was at 'and, and he
knew bloomin' well that if they didn't see him soon they'd never see
him again.
"He'd taken notice afore the darkness had drawn down of a cutter
bearing about northeast. He watched her now whilst it was light, for
it looked to him as if she was making a straight course for the
sands. It was plain she wasn't under no government. The wind blew
her along, and at eight o'clock that evening, when the moon was
rising and the tide making fast all about the sands, I'm blest if
that cutter didn't come quietly ashore, and lie as sweetly still as
if she was a young woman wore out with walkin'.
"I allow that it didn't take that there Mason a lifetime to scramble
aboard of her. She was a fine boat, 'bout sixteen or eighteen ton,
newly sheathed, and her sails shone white and new in the moon. When
he got aboard he sung out, 'Anybody here?' and he received no reply.
There was a bit of a forehatch; he put his 'ead into it and sung out,
and several times he sung out, and got no answer; he then walked aft.
I must tell you, it was a very quiet night, with a light breeze and
plenty of stars, and a growing moon. He looks through the bit of a
skylight, and sees nothen; puts his head in the companion-way and
sings out as afore. An abandoned wessel, he thinks to himself, and
his 'eart, you may be sure, turns to and rejoices.
"What should he do? Try to kedge her off himself? That was beyond
him. Send up a rocket, if he should find such a thing in the vessel?
S'elp me, he was that greedy he couldn't make up his mind to ask for
'elp. He took a look round the sea and considered. There was some
big lump of shadow out behind the sands--she looked like a French
smack; his boat was out of sight in the dark, but the cutter, he
noticed, carried a little jolly boat, amidships, right fair in the
wake of the gangway, easy to be launched, smack fashion, so that
there Mason felt his life was saved.
"He carried some lucifers in his pocket for lighting his pipe; he
stepped into the cabin, and struck a light. A lamp was hung up close
against his 'and; it was ready trimmed, and he set the wick afire,
and looked round. What did he see? As beautiful a little cabin as
the hinvention of man could figure. The sides of the wessel had been
picked out by artists, and that there Mason swears no man ever saw
finer pictures in his life--ladies a-bathin', gentlemen chasin' with
hounds, a steamer going along; both sides had been picked out into
pictures, and that there Mason looked around him with his mouth
opening and opening. There was likewise lookin' glasses; a thick
carpet; the lamps seemed to be made of silver, and there was such a
twinkling of silver all about, what with the 'andles of doors and a
lot of forks and spoons on the table, that Mason's eyes began to
dance in his evil old nut, and he reckoned himself a made man for
life. Look at him as he leans there.
"But what else did he see? The door of a cabin right aft stood open,
and half-way in and half-way out lay the body of a man; his throat
was most horribly cut; not by 's own 'hand. No man could nearly cut
his own 'ead half off as that chap's was. He'd been murdered, and
there was no man in that beautiful little cutter saving that bleedin'
corpse. It was a sight to have thickened the wind-pipe of most men,
and set them a-breathin' hard and tight; but he saw nothing but a man
with his throat cut. He took a look at him, and reckoned him to be a
furriner, as, indeed, the whole little ship seemed. It was a very
quiet night, and he stood looking at the dead body considering what
he should do. If he brought assistance from the shore, and the
cutter was towed into port, his share of the salvage money--for the
rewards are small in jobs of this sort when the weather is fine and
there is no risk of life--his share, I says, of the money would be
scarcely worth talking about. Same time, if he left the cutter to
lie, and it came on to blow, she'd go to pieces afore the morning.
That wasn't his consarn, he thought; he had come to the Good'ins on
the look-out for a job, and had got one, and he made up his mind to
make the most of his chances.
"So the first thing that there Mason did was to stoop down and
plunder the body. Plenty was on it. I can see in fancy the looks of
his face as he 'elped himself; he found a beautiful gold watch and
chain, a diamond ring, and another ring, a lot of gold coins in
French money in one pocket, and French money in silver coin in
another. He found a silver toothpick, an eye-glass, and I can't tell
you what besides. He was in high feather, a very 'appy man; he fills
his pockets with the forks and spoons, supposing them silver, tho'
they wasn't. He looked into the cabin where the dead body lay, but
found nothen but bed-clothes and male wearin' apparel hangin' to the
bulkhead. There was a chest of drawers full of good linen shirts and
vests and the like of that. But that there Mason thought of Cocky
Honour, the Customs man, and abandoned the idea of makin' up them
shirts into a parcel.
"It was his notion to get away in the cutter's jolly boat or dinghey,
and he stood looking about him to see if there was anything else he
could put in his pockets. All at once he heard a noise of men's
voices alongside, and, immediately arter, the 'eavy tread of
fishermen's boots over'ead. Afore he could get on deck, a big chap,
with a red night-cap on, came down the little companion-ladder, and
instantly roars out something in French. Down comes others--three or
four. 'Twas a minute or two afore they took notice of the Mason, who
stared back. They then set up a howl, and fell a-brandishing their
arms, as if they were gone stark mad.
"'You killee him!' roars one.
"'No, no,' sings out Mason, 'me no killee, me find him killee.'
"'You killee him,' roars the great man with the cap, lookin' most
ferocious, for that here Mason says his face was nearly all hair,
besides that he squinted most damnably, beggin' of your pardon. And
then he began to shout to the others, who shouted back at him, all
talkin' at the top of their voices, as is the custom in France when
excited, and all lookin' at that there Mason.
"Suddenly they all rushed at him, knocked him down, overhauled his
pockets, and brought out the spoons and forks and the dead gent's
gold watch and chain, and the rest of the plunder.
"'You killee!' roared the big man in the cap, and layin' hold of him,
they ran him into the cabin where the corpse was, and locked him up
with the body, and presently that there Mason, who was next door to
ravin' mad, felt that they was warping the cutter off--that, in
short, she was off, and, by the noise of passin' waters, either
sailing or in tow.
"And now to end this, sir, what do you think happened to that there
Mason? She was a French smack that had sighted and boarded the
cutter; that was a Frenchman likewise, and they towed her straight to
Boulogne, at which place they arrived at about ten o'clock in the
morning. Numbers was on the pier to see the uncommon sight of a
smack towing an abandoned cutter. That there Mason was handed over
to the authorities, charged with murder and robbery. The British
Consul took up the case. When the facts were stated, and inquiries
made, his innocence was established; but not afore he'd lain three
weeks in a beastly jail, fed on black bread, and denied his pipe. I
don't say he came home much changed; but I allow the disappointment
sunk as deep as his heart, and blacked it. And to this hour he's not
fit company for man nor beast. Look at him as he leans!"
Laughing together, we strolled off for our drinks, and I saw Mason
turn his head to watch us as we walked.
The Hand on the Latch
BY MARY CHOLMONDELEY
There came a man across the moor.
Fell and foul of face was he.
He left the path by the cross-roads three,
And stood in the shadow of the door.
MARY COLERIDGE.
She stood at her low window with its uneven wavering glass, and
looked out across the prairie. A little snow had fallen--not much,
only enough to add a sense of desolation to the boundless plain, the
infinite plain outside the four cramped walls of her log hut. The
log hut was like a tiny boat moored in some vast, tideless,
impassable sea. The immensity of the prairie had crushed her in the
earlier years of her married life, but gradually she had become
accustomed to it, then reconciled to it, at last almost a part of it.
The gray had come early to her thick hair, a certain fixity to the
quiet courage of her eyes. Her calm, steadfast face showed that she
was not given to depression, but nevertheless this evening, as she
stood watching for her husband's return, for the first distant speck
of him where the cart rut vanished into the plain, a sense of
impending misfortune enfolded her with the dusk. Was it because the
first snow had fallen? Ah me! how much it meant. It was as
significant for her as the gray pallor that falls on a sick man's
face. It meant the endless winter, the greater isolation instead of
the lesser, the powerlessness to move hand or foot in that
all-enveloping shroud; the struggle, not for existence--with him
beside her that was assured--not for luxury--she had ceased to care
for it, though he had not ceased to care for her sake--but for life
in any but its narrowest sense. Books, letters, human speech,
through the long months these would be almost entirely denied her.
The sudden remembrance of the larger needs of life flooded her soul,
touching to momentary semblance of movement many things long
cherished, but long since dead, like delicate sea plants beyond
high-water mark that cannot exist between the long droughts when the
neap tide does not come. She had known what she was doing when
against the wishes of her family she of the South had married him of
the North, when she left the busy city life she knew, and clave to
her husband, following him over the rim of the world, as women will
follow while they have feet to follow with. She was his superior in
birth, cultivation, refinement, but she had never regretted what she
had done. The regrets were his for her, for the poverty to which he
had brought her, and to which she had not been accustomed. She had
only one regret, if such a thin strip of a word as regret can be used
to describe her passionate controlled desolation, immense as the
prairie, because she had no child. Perhaps if they had had children
the walls of the log hut in the waste might have closed in on them
less rigidly. It might have become more of a home.
Her mind had taken its old mechanical bent, the trend of long habit
as she looked out from that low window. How often she had stood
there, and thought "If only we might have had a child." And now by
sheer force of habit she thought it yet again. And then a slow
rapture took possession of her whole being, mounted, mounted till she
leaned against the window-sill faint with joy. She was to have a
child after all. She had hardly dared believe it at first, but as
time had gone on a vague hope, quickly suppressed as unbearable, had
turned to suspense, suspense had alternated with the fierce despair
that precedes certainty. Certainty had come at last, clear and calm
and exquisite as dawn. She would have a child in the spring. What
was the winter to her now! Nothing but a step toward joy. The world
was all broken up and made new. The prairie, its great loneliness,
its deathlike solitude, were gone out of her life. She was to have a
child in the spring. She had not dared to tell her husband till she
was sure. But she would tell him this evening when they were sitting
together over the fire.
She stood motionless in the deepening dusk, trying to be calm. And
at last in the far distance she saw a speck arise, as it were, out of
a crease in the level earth--her husband on his horse. How many
hundreds of times she had seen him appear over the rim of the world,
just as he was appearing now! She lit the lamp and put it in the
window. She blew the log fire to a blaze. The firelight danced on
the wooden walls, crowded with cheap pictures, and on the few
precious daguerreotypes that reminded her she too had brothers and
sisters and kin of her own, far away in one of those southern cities
where the war was still smouldering grimly on.
Her husband took his horse round and stalled him. Presently he came
in. They stood a moment together in silence as their custom was, and
she leaned her forehead against his shoulder. Then she busied
herself with his supper, and he sat down heavily at the little table.
"Had you any difficulty this time in getting the money together?" she
asked.
Her husband was a tax collector.
"None," he said abstractedly, "at least--yes--a little. But I have
it all, and the arrears as well. It makes a large sum."
He was evidently thinking of something else. She did not speak
again. She saw something was troubling him.
"I heard news to-day at Phillip's," he said at last, "which I don't
like. If I had heard in time, and if I could have borrowed a fresh
horse, I would have ridden straight on to ----. But it was too late
in the day to be safe, and you would have been anxious what had
become of me if I had been out all night with all this money on me.
I shall go to-morrow as soon as it is light."
They discussed the business which took him to the nearest town thirty
miles away, where their small savings were invested--somewhat
precariously as it turned out. What was safe, who was safe while the
invisible war between North and South smouldered on and on? It had
not come near them, but as an earthquake which is engulfing cities in
one part of Europe will rattle a teacup without oversetting it on a
cottage shelf half a continent away--so the Civil War had reached
them at last.
"I take a hopeful view," lie said, but his face was overcast. "I
don't see why we should lose the little we have. It has been hard
enough to scrape it together, God knows. Promptitude and joint
action with Reynolds will probably save it. But I must be prompt."
He still spoke abstractedly, as if even now he were thinking of
something else.
He began to take out of the leathern satchel various bags of money.
"Shall I help you to count it?"
She often did so.
They counted the flimsy dirty paper money together, and put it all
back into the various labelled bags.
"It comes right," he said.
Suddenly she said, "But you can't pay it into the bank to-morrow if
you go to ----"
"I know," he said, looking at her; "that is what I have been thinking
of ever since I heard Phillip's news. I don't like leaving you with
all this money in the house, but I must."
She was silent. She was not frightened for herself, but it was state
money, not their own. She was not nervous as he was, but she had
always shared with him a certain dread of those bulging bags, and had
always been thankful to see him return safe--he never went twice by
the same track--after paying the money in. In those wild days when
men went armed with their lives in their hands it was not well to be
known to have large sums about you.
He looked at the bags, frowning.
"I am not afraid," she said.
"There is no real need to be," he said after a moment. "When I leave
to-morrow morning it will be thought I have gone to pay it in.
Still--"
He did not finish his sentence, but she knew what was in his mind:
the great loneliness of the prairie. Out in the white night came the
short, sharp yap of a wolf.
"I am not afraid," she said again.
"I shall only be gone one night," he said.
"I have often been a night alone."
"I know," he said, "but somehow it's worse leaving you with so much
money in the house."
"No one knows it will be there."
"That is true," he said, "except that everyone knows I have been
collecting large sums."
"They will think you have gone to pay it in as usual."
"Yes," he said with an effort.
Then he got up, and went to his tool box. She watched him open it,
seeing him in a new light, which encompassed him with even greater
love. "If I tell him to-night," she thought, "it will make him even
more anxious about leaving me. Perhaps he would refuse to go, and he
must go. I will not tell him till he comes back."
The resolution not to speak was like taking hold of a piece of iron
in frost. She had not known it would hurt so much. A new
tremulousness, sweet and strange, passed over her--not cowardice, not
fear, not of the heart nor of the mind, but a sort of emotion of the
whole being.
"I will not tell him," she said again.
Her husband got out his tools, took up a plank from the floor, and
put the money into a hole beneath it, beside their small valuables,
such as they were, in a biscuit tin. Then he replaced the plank,
screwed it down, and she drew back a small fur mat over the place.
He put away the tools and then came and stood in front of her. He
was not conscious of her transfiguration, and she dropped her eyes
for fear of showing it.
"I shall start early," he said, "as soon as it is light, and I shall
be back before sundown the day after to-morrow. I know it is
unreasonable, but I shall go easier in my mind if you will promise me
one thing."
"What is it?"
"Not to go out of the house, or to let any one else come in on any
pretence whatever, while I am away," he said "Bar everything, and
stay inside."
"I sha'n't want to go out."
He made an impatient movement.
"Promise me that come what will you will let no one in during my
absence," he said.
"I promise."
"Swear it."
She hesitated.
"Swear it to please me," he said.
"I swear that I will let no one into the house, on any pretext
whatever, until you come back," she said, smiling at him.
He sighed and relapsed into his chair, and gave way to the great
fatigue that possessed him.
The next morning he started soon after daybreak, but not until he had
brought her in sufficient fuel to last several days. There had been
more snow in the night, fine snow like salt, but not enough to make
traveling difficult. She watched him ride away, and silenced the
voice within her which always said as she saw him go, "You will never
see him again, you have heard his voice for the last time." Perhaps,
after all, the difference between the brave and the cowardly lies in
how they deal with that voice. Both hear it. She silenced it
instantly. It spoke again more insistently: "You have heard his
voice, felt his kiss, for the last time. He will never see the face
of his child." She silenced it again, and went about her work.
The day passed as countless other days had passed. She was
accustomed to be much alone. She had work to do, enough and to
spare, within the little home which was to become a real home, please
God, in the spring. The evening fell almost before she expected it.
She locked and barred the doors, and closed the shutters of the
windows. She made all secure, as she had done many a time before.
And then putting aside her work, she took down the newest of her
well-worn books lately sent her from New Orleans and began to read:
Oui, sans doute, tout meurt; ce monde est un grand rêve,
Et le peu de bonheur qui nous vient en chemin,
Nous n'avon pas plus tôt ce roseau dans la main,
Que le vent nous l'enlève.
Que le vent nous l'enlève. She repeated the last words to herself.
Ah! no. The wind could not take her happiness out of her hand.
A wandering wind had arisen at nightfall, and it came softly across
the snow and tried the doors and windows as with a furtive hand. She
could hear it coming as from an immense distance, passing with a
sigh, returning plaintive, homeless, forlorn, to whisper round the
house:
Pai vu sous le soleil tomber bien d'autres choses
Que les feuilles des bois, et l'écume des eaux,
Bien d'autres s'en aller que le parfum des roses
Et le chant des oiseaux.
That wind meant more snow. Involuntarily she laid down her book and
listened to it.
How like the sound of the wind was to wandering footsteps, slowly
drawing near, creeping round the house. She could almost have
fancied that a hand touched the shutters, was even now trying to
raise the latch of the door.
A moment of intense silence, in which the wind seemed to hold its
breath and listen without, while she listened within, and then a low,
distinct knock upon the door.
She did not move.
"It is the wind," she said to herself; but she knew it was not.
The knock came again, low, urgent, not to be denied.
She had become very cold. She had supposed fear was an emotion of
the mind. She had not reckoned for this slow paralysis of the body.
She managed to creep to the window and unbar the shutter an inch or
two. By pressing her face against the extreme corner of the pane she
could just discern in the snow light part of a man's figure, wrapped
in a long cloak.
She barred the window once more. She was not surprised. She knew
now that she had known it always. She had pretended to herself that
the thief would not come; but she was expecting him when he knocked.
And he stood there, outside. Presently he would be inside.
He knocked yet again, this time more loudly. What need was there for
silence when for miles and miles round there was no ear to hear save
that of a chance prairie dog?
She laid hold upon her courage, seeing that it was her only refuge,
and went to the door.
"Who is there?" she said through a chink.
A man's voice, low and feeble, replied, "Let me in."
"I cannot let you in."
There was a short silence.
"I pray you let me in," he said again.
"I have told you I cannot. Who are you?"
"I am a soldier, wounded. I'm trying to get back to my friends at
----." He mentioned a settlement about fifty miles north. "I have
missed my way, and I can't drag myself any further."
Her heart swung violently between suspicion and compassion.
"I am alone in the house," she said. "My husband is away, and he
made me promise not to let anyone in on any pretence whatever during
his absence."
"Then I shall die on your doorstep," said the voice. "I can't drag
myself any further."
There was another silence.
"It is beginning to snow," he said.
"I know," she said; and he heard the trouble in her voice.
"Open the door and look at me," he said, "and see if I can do you any
harm."
She opened the door and stood on the threshold, barring the way. He
was leaning against the doorpost with his head against it, as she had
often seen her husband lean when he was talking to her on a summer
evening. Something in his attitude, so like her husband's, touched
her strangely. Supposing he were in need, and pleaded for help in
vain!
The man turned his face toward her. It was sunk and hollow, ravaged
with pain, an evil-looking face. His right arm was in a sling under
his tattered military cloak. He seemed to have made his final
effort, and now stood staring dumbly at her.
"My husband will never forgive me," she said with a sort of sob.
He said nothing more. He seemed at the last point of exhaustion.
Through the dim white night a few flakes of snow fell upon his harsh,
repellent face and on his bandaged arm.
A sudden wave of pity carried all before it.
She beckoned him into the house, and locked and barred the door. She
put him in her husband's chair by the fire. He hardly noticed
anything. He seemed stupefied. He sat staring alternately at the
fire and at her. When she asked him to what regiment he belonged he
did not answer.
She set before him the supper she had prepared for herself, and
chafed his hard, emaciated dirty hand till the warmth returned to it.
Then he ate, with difficulty at first, then with slow voracity, all
she had put before him.
A semblance of life returned gradually to him.
"I was pretty near done up when I knocked," he said several times.
She dressed his wound, which did not appear very deep, wrapped it in
fresh bandages, and readjusted his sling. He took it all as a matter
of course.
She made up a little bed of rugs and blankets for him in the back
kitchen. When she came back to the living room she found he had
dragged himself to his feet, and was looking vacantly at a little
picture of President Lincoln on the mantel-shelf. She showed him the
bed and told him to lie down on it. He obeyed her implicitly, like a
child. She left him, and presently heard him cast himself down. A
few minutes later she went to the door and listened. His heavy,
regular breathing told her he was asleep.
She went back to the kitchen and sat down by the fire.
Was he really asleep? Was it all feigned--the wound, the story, the
exhaustion? Had she been trapped? Oh! what had she done? What had
she done?
She seemed like two people. One self, silent, alert, experienced,
fearless, knew that she had allowed herself to be deluded in spite of
being warned, knew that her feelings had been played upon, made use
of, not even dexterously made use of; knew that she had disobeyed her
husband, broken her solemn oath to him, plunged him with herself into
disgrace if the money were stolen. And in the eyes of that self it
was already stolen. It was still under the plank beneath her feet,
but it was already stolen.
The other self, tremulous, inconsequent, full of irresistible
tenderness for suffering and weakness even in its uncouthest garb,
said incessantly:
"I could do no less. If I die for it, still I could do no less.
Somebody brought him into the world. Some woman cried for joy and
anguish when he was born. He would have died if I had not taken him
in. I could do no less."
Through the long hours she sat by the fire, unable to reconcile
herself to going upstairs to her own room and to bed.
Once she got up and noiselessly took down her husband's revolver from
the mantel-shelf and examined it. He had taken its fellow with him,
and apparently contrary to his custom he had taken the powder flask
with him too, for it was gone from its nail. The revolvers were
always kept loaded, but--by some evil chance the one that remained
was unloaded. She could have sworn she had seen her husband load it
two days ago. Why was this numbness creeping over her again? She
got out powder and bullets from a small store she had of her own,
loaded and primed it, and laid it on the table beside her.
The night had become very still. Her hearing seemed to reach out
till she felt she could have heard a coyote move in its hole miles
away. The log fire creaked and shifted. The tall clock in the
corner ticked, catching its chain now and then, as its manner was.
The wooden walls shrunk and groaned a little. The small home-like
sounds only accentuated the enormous silence without. Suddenly in
the midst of them a real sound fell upon her ear; very low but
different, not like the fragmentary inadvertent murmur of the hut; a
small, purposeful, stealthy sound, aware of itself. She listened as
she had listened before, without moving. It was not louder than the
whittling of a mouse behind the wainscot, hardly louder than the
scraping of a mole's thin hand in the soil. It continued. Then it
stopped. It was only her foolish fancy, after all. There it was
again. Where did it come from?
The man in the next room?
She took up the lamp and crept down the narrow passage to the door of
the back kitchen. His loud, even breathing sounded distinctly
through the crannies of the ill-fitting door. Surely it was
overloud. She listened to it. She could hear nothing else. Was his
breathing a pretence? She opened the door noiselessly, and went in,
shading the light with her hand.
She bent over the sleeping man. At the first glance her heart sank,
for he had not taken off his boots. But as she looked hard at him
her suspicions died within her. He lay on his back, with his coarse,
emaciated face toward her, his mouth open, showing his broken teeth.
The sleep of utter exhaustion was upon him. She could have killed
him as he lay. He was not acting. He was really asleep.
She crept out of the room again, leaving the door ajar, and went back
to the kitchen.
Hardly had she sat down when she heard the sound again. It was too
faint to reach her except when she was in the kitchen. She knew now
where it came from--the door. Some one was picking the lock.
The instant the sleeping man was out of her sight she suspected him
again.
Was he really asleep, after all? He had not taken off his boots.
When she came back from making his bed she had found him standing by
the mantel-shelf. Had he unloaded the pistol in her absence? Would
he presently get up, and open the door to his confederates?
Her mind rose clear and cold and unflinching. She took up the
pistol, and then laid it down again. She wanted a more noiseless
weapon. She got out her husband's great clasp-knife from the open
tool box, took the lamp, and crept back to the man's bedside. She
should be able to kill him. Certainly she should be able to kill
him; and then she should have the pistol for the other one.
But he still slept heavily. When she saw him again, again her
suspicions fell from her. She knew he was asleep.
She shook him by the shoulder, noiselessly, but with increasing
violence, until he opened his eyes with a groan. Then only she
remembered that she was shaking his wounded arm. He saw the knife in
her hand, and raised his left arm as if to ward off the blow.
"Listen," she whispered, close to his ear. "Don't speak. There is a
man trying to break into the house. You must get up and help me."
He stared at her, vaguely at first, but with growing intelligence.
The food and sleep had restored him somewhat to himself. He sat up
on the couch.
"Take off my boots," he whispered; "I tried and could not."
Her last suspicion of him vanished. She cut the laces with her
knife, and dragged his boots off. They stuck to his feet, and bits
of the woollen socks came off with them. They had evidently not been
taken off for weeks. While she did it he whispered, "Why should any
one be wanting to break in? There's nothing here to take."
"Yes, there is," she said. "There's a lot of money."
"Good Lord! Where?"
"Under the floor in the kitchen."
"Then it's the kitchen they'll make for. You bet they know where the
money is if they know it's here. Are there many of 'em?"
"I don't know."
"Well, we shall know soon enough," said the man. He had become
alert, keen. "Have you any pistols?"
"Yes, one."
"Fetch it, but don't make a sound, mind."
She stole away, and returned with the pistol. She would have put it
into his hand, but he pushed it away.
"It's no use to me," he said, "with my arm in a sling. I will see
what I can do with my left hand and the knife. Can you shoot?"
"Yes."
"Can you hit anything?"
"Yes."
"To be depended on?"
"Yes."
"Well, it's darned lucky. How long will that door hold?"
They were both in the little passage by now, pressed close together,
listening to the furtive pick, pick of some one at the lock.
"I don't think it will hold more than a minute."
"Now, look here," he said, "I shall go and stand at the foot of the
stair, and knife the second man, if there is a second. The first man
I'll leave to you. There's a bit of light outside from the snow.
He'll let in enough light to see him by as he opens the door. Don't
wait. Fire at him as he comes in, and don't stop; go on firing at
him till he drops. You've got six bullets. Don't you make any
mistake and shoot me. I've had enough of that already. Now you look
carefully where I'm going to stand, and when I'm there you put out
the lamp."
He spoke to her as a man does to his comrade.
That she could be frightened did not seem to enter his calculations.
He moved with catlike stealth to the foot of the tiny staircase and
flattened himself against the wall. Then he stretched his left arm
once or twice as if to make sure of it, licked the haft of the knife,
and nodded at her.
She instantly put out the lamp.
All was dark save for a faint thread of light which outlined the
door. Across the thread something moved once--twice. The sound of
picking ceased. Then another sound succeeded it, a new one, unlike
the last, as if something were being gently prised open, wrenched.
"The bar will hold," she said to herself, and then remembered for the
first time that the rung into which the bar slid had been loose these
many days. It was giving now.
It had given!
The door opened silently, and a man came in.
For a moment she saw him clear, with the accomplice snow-light behind
him. She did not hesitate. She shot once and again. He fell and
struggled violently up, and she shot again. He fell and dragged
himself to his knees, and she shot again. Then he sank gently and
slowly down as if tired, with his face against the wall, and moved no
more.
The man on the stairs rushed out and looked through the open door.
"By G--, he was single-handed!" he said.
Then he stooped over the prostrate man and turned him over on his
back.
"Dead!" he said, chuckling. "Well done, Missus!--stone dead!"
He was masked.
The dirty left hand tore the mask callously off the gray face.
The woman had drawn near and looked over his shoulder.
"Do you know him?" said the man.
For a moment she did not answer, and the pistol which had done its
work so well dropped noisily out of her palsied hand.
"He is a stranger to me," she said, looking fixedly at her husband's
fading face.
The Stories of the Three Burglars
FRANK R. STOCKTON
I am a householder in a pleasant country neighborhood, about twenty
miles from New York. My family consists of myself and wife, our boy,
George William, aged two, two maid-servants, and a man; but in the
summer we have frequent visitors, and at the time of which I am about
to write my Aunt Martha was staying with us.
My house is large and pleasant, and we have neighbors near enough for
social purposes and yet not too near or too many to detract from the
rural aspect of our surroundings. But we do not live in a paradise;
we are occasionally troubled by mosquitoes and burglars.
Against the first of these annoyances we have always been able to
guard ourselves, at least in a measure, and our man and the cook
declare that they have become so used to them that they do not mind
them; but to guard against burglars is much more difficult, and to
become used to them would, I think, require a great deal of practice.
For several months before the period of this narrative our
neighborhood had been subject to visits from burglars. From time to
time houses had been entered and robbed, and the offenders had never
been detected.
We had no police force, not even a village organization. There was a
small railway station near our house, and six miles away was the
county town. For fire and police protection each household was
obliged to depend upon itself.
Before the beginning of the burglarious enterprises in our midst, we
had not felt the need of much protection in this direction; sometimes
poultry was stolen, but this was a rare occurrence, and, although
windows and doors were generally fastened for the night, this labor
was often considered much more troublesome than necessary. But now a
great change had taken place in the feelings of our community. When
the first robbery occurred the neighbors were inclined to laugh about
it, and to say that Captain Hubbard's habit of sitting up after the
rest of his family had gone to bed and then retiring and forgetting
to close the front door had invited the entrance of a passing tramp.
But when a second and a third house, where windows and doors had not
been left open, had been entered, and, in a measure, despoiled,
people ceased to laugh; and if there had been any merriment at all on
the subject, it would have been caused by the extraordinary and
remarkable precautions taken against the entrance of thieves by
night. The loaded pistol became the favorite companion of the head
of the house; those who had no watch-dogs bought them; there were new
locks, new bolts, new fastenings. At one time there was a mounted
patrol of young men, which, however, was soon broken up by their
mothers. But this trouble was unavailing, for at intervals the
burglaries continued.
As a matter of course a great many theories were broached as to the
reasons for this disturbance in our hitherto peaceful neighborhood.
We were at such a distance from the ordinary centers of crime that it
was generally considered that professional burglars would hardly take
the trouble to get to us or to get away from us, and that, therefore,
the offenses were probably committed by unsuspected persons living in
this part of the country who had easy means of determining which
houses were worth breaking into and what method of entrance would be
most feasible. In this way some families, hitherto regarded as
respectable families, had fallen under suspicion.
So far, mine was the only house of any importance within the distance
of a mile from the station, which had not in some way suffered from
burglars. In one or two of these cases the offenders had been
frightened away before they had done any other injury than the
breaking of a window-shutter; but we had been spared any visitation
whatever. After a time we began to consider that this was an
invidious distinction. Of course we did not desire that robbers
should break into our house and steal, but it was a sort of implied
insult that robbers should think that our house was not worth
breaking into. We contrived, however, to bear up under this implied
contempt and even under the facetious imputations of some of our
lively neighbors, who declared that it looked very suspicious that we
should lose nothing, and even continue to add to our worldly goods,
while everybody else was suffering from abstractions.
I did not, however, allow any relaxation in my vigilance in the
protection of my house and family. My time to suffer had not yet
arrived, and it might not arrive at all; but if it did come it should
not be my fault. I therefore carefully examined all the new
precautions my neighbors had taken against the entrance of thieves,
and where I approved of them I adopted them.
Of some of these my wife and I did not approve. For instance, a tin
pan containing iron spoons, the dinner bell, and a miscellaneous
collection of hardware balanced on the top stair of the staircase,
and so connected with fine cords that a thief coming up the stairs
would send it rattling and bounding to the bottom, was looked upon by
us with great disfavor. The descent of the pan, whether by innocent
accident or the approach of a burglar, might throw our little boy
into a fit, to say nothing of the terrible fright it would give my
Aunt Martha, who was a maiden lady of middle age, and not accustomed
to a clatter in the night. A bull-dog in the house my wife would not
have, nor, indeed, a dog of any kind. George William was not yet old
enough to play with dogs, especially a sharp one; and if the dog was
not sharp it was of no use to have him in the house. To the ordinary
burglar-alarm she strongly objected. She had been in houses where
these things went off of their own accord, occasioning great
consternation; and, besides, she said that if thieves got into the
house she did not want to know it and she did not want me to know it;
the quicker they found what they came for and went away with it the
better. Of course, she wished them kept out, if such a thing were
possible; but if they did get in, our duty as parents of the dearest
little boy was non-interference. She insisted, however, that the
room in which the loveliest of children slept, and which, was also
occupied by ourselves, should be made absolutely burglar proof; and
this object, by means of extraordinary bolts and chains, I flattered
myself I accomplished. My Aunt Martha had a patent contrivance for
fastening a door that she always used, whether at home or traveling,
and in whose merit she placed implicit confidence. Therefore we did
not feel it necessary to be anxious about her; and the servants slept
at the top of the house, where thieves would not be likely to go.
"They may continue to slight us by their absence," said my wife, "but
I do not believe that they will be able to frighten us by their
presence."
I was not, however, so easily contented as my wife. Of course I
wished to do everything possible to protect George William and the
rest of the family, but I was also very anxious to protect our
property in all parts of the house. Therefore, in addition to
everything else I had done, I devised a scheme for interfering with
the plans of men who should feloniously break into our home.
After a consultation with a friend, who was a physician greatly
interested in the study of narcotic drugs, I procured a mixture which
was almost tasteless and without peculiar odor, and of which a small
quantity would in less than a minute throw an ordinary man into a
state of unconsciousness. The potion was, however, no more dangerous
in its effects than that quantity of ardent spirits which would cause
entire insensibility. After the lapse of several hours, the person
under the influence of the drug would recover consciousness without
assistance. But in order to provide against all contingencies my
friend prepared a powerful antidote, which would almost immediately
revive one who had been made unconscious by our potion.
The scheme that I had devised may possibly have been put into use by
others. But of this I know not. I thought it a good scheme and
determined to experiment with it, and, if possible, to make a trap
which should catch a burglar. I would reveal this plan to no one but
my friend the physician and my wife. Secrecy would be an important
element in its success.
Our library was a large and pleasant room on the ground floor of the
house, and here I set my trap. It was my habit to remain in this
room an hour or so after the rest of the family had gone to bed, and,
as I was an early riser, I was always in it again before it was
necessary for a servant to enter in the morning.
Before leaving the library for the night I placed in a conspicuous
position in the room a small table, on which was a tray holding two
decanters partially filled with wine, in the one red and in the other
white. There was also upon the tray an open box of biscuit and three
wine-glasses, two of them with a little wine at the bottom. I took
pains to make it appear that these refreshments had been recently
partaken of. There were biscuit crumbs upon the tray, and a drop or
two of wine was freshly spilled upon it every time the trap was set.
The table, thus arranged, was left in the room during the night, and
early in the morning I put the tray and its contents into a closet
and locked it up.
A portion of my narcotic preparation was thoroughly mixed with the
contents of each of the decanters in such proportions that a glass of
the wine would be sufficient to produce the desired effect.
It was my opinion that there were few men who, after a night walk and
perhaps some labor in forcibly opening a door or a window-shutter,
would not cease for a moment in pursuance of their self-imposed task
to partake of the refreshments so conveniently left behind them by
the occupants of the house when they retired to rest. Should my
surmises be correct, I might reasonably expect, should my house be
broken into, to find an unconscious burglar in the library when I
went down in the morning. And I was sure, and my wife agreed with
me, that if I should find a burglar in that room or any other part of
the house, it was highly desirable that he should be an unconscious
one.
Night after night I set my burglar trap, and morning after morning I
locked it up in the closet. I cannot say that I was exactly
disappointed that no opportunity offered to test the value of my
plan, but it did seem a pity that I should take so much trouble for
nothing. It had been some weeks since any burglaries had been
committed in the neighborhood, and it was the general opinion that
the miscreants had considered this field worked out and had
transferred their labors to a better-paying place. The insult of
having been considered unworthy the attention of the knights of the
midnight jimmy remained with us, but as all our goods and chattels
also remained with us we could afford to brook the indignity.
As the trap cost nothing my wife did not object to my setting it
every night for the present. Something might happen, she remarked,
and it was just as well to be prepared in more ways than one; but
there was a point upon which she was very positive.
"When George William is old enough to go about the house by himself,"
she said, "those decanters must not be left exposed upon the table.
Of course I do not expect him to go about the house drinking wine and
everything that he finds, but there is no knowing what a child in the
first moments of his investigative existence may do."
For myself, I became somewhat tired of acting my part in this little
farce every night and morning, but when I have undertaken anything of
this sort I am slow to drop it.
It was about three weeks since I had begun to set my trap when I was
awakened in the night by a sudden noise. I sat up in bed, and as I
did so my wife said to me sleepily--
"What is that? Was it thunder? There it is again!" she exclaimed,
starting up. "What a crash! It must have struck somewhere." I did
not answer. It was not thunder. It was something in the house, and
it flashed into my mind that perhaps my trap had been sprung. I got
out of bed and began rapidly to dress.
"What are you going to do?" anxiously asked my wife.
"I'm going to see what has happened," said I. At that moment there
was another noise. This was like two or three heavy footsteps,
followed by a sudden thump; but it was not so loud as the others.
"John," cried my wife, "don't stir an inch, it's burglars!" and she
sprang out of bed and seized me by the arm.
"I must go down," I said; "but there is really no reason for your
being frightened. I shall call David, and shall carry my pistol, so
there is really no danger. If there are thieves in the house they
have probably decamped by this time--that that is, if they are able
to do so, for of course they must know that noise would awaken the
soundest sleepers."
My wife looked at me and then slowly withdrew her hands from my arm.
"You promise me," she said, "if you find a burglar downstairs in the
possession of his senses you will immediately come back to me and
George William?"
I promised her, and, slipping on some clothes, I went out into the
second-story hall. I carried no light. Before I had reached the
bottom of the back stairs I heard David, my man, coming down. To be
sure it was he and not a burglar I spoke to him in a low voice, my
pistol raised in case of an unsatisfactory reply.
"I heard that noise, sir," he whispered, "and was going down to see
about it."
"Are you ready if it's thieves?" I whispered.
"I have got the biscuit-beater," he replied.
"Come on, then," said I, and we went downstairs.
I had left no light in the library, but there was one there now, and
it shone through the open door into the hallway. We stopped and
listened. There was no sound, and then slowly and cautiously we
approached the door of the library. The scene I beheld astounded me,
and involuntarily I sprang back a step or two. So did David; but in
an instant we saw that there was no need of retreat or defense.
Stretched upon the floor, not far from the doorway, lay a tall man,
his face upturned to the light of a bull's-eye lantern which stood by
the mantel-piece. His eyes were shut, and it was evident that he was
perfectly insensible. Near by, in the wreck of the small table,
glasses, and decanters, lay another man, apparently of heavier build.
He also was as still as a corpse. A little further back, half
sitting on the floor, with the upper part of his body resting against
the lounge, was another man with a black mask over his face.
"Are they dead?" exclaimed David, in an undertone of horror.
"No," said I, "they are not dead; they have been caught in my trap."
And I must admit that the consciousness of this created a proud
exultation of spirit within me. I had overmatched these rascals;
they were prostrated before me. If one of them moved, David and I
could kill him. But I did not believe there would be any killing,
nor any moving for the present.
In a high whisper, which could have been heard distinctly all over
the house, my wife now called to me from the top of the stairs.
"What is it?" she said. "What has happened?"
I stepped quickly to the stairway.
"Everything is all right," I said in a loud, distinct voice, intended
to assure my wife that there was no necessity for caution or alarm..
"I will be with you presently."
"I am glad to hear that nothing is the matter," said Aunt Martha, now
for the first time opening her door. "I was afraid something had
happened."
But I had business to attend to before I could go upstairs. In
thinking over and arranging this plan for the capture of burglars, I
had carefully considered its various processes, and had provided
against all the contingencies I could think of; therefore I was not
now obliged to deliberate what I should do. "Keep your eye on them,"
said I to David, "and if one of them moves be ready for him. The
first thing to do is to tie them hand and foot."
I quickly lighted a lamp, and then took from another shelf of the
closet a large coil of strong cotton rope, which I had provided for
such an occasion as the present.
"Now," said I to David, "I will tie them while you stand by to knock
over any one of them who attempts to get up."
The instrument with which David was prepared to carry out my orders
was a formidable one. In the days of my youth my family was very
fond of "Maryland biscuit," which owes much of its delicacy to the
fact that before baking it is pounded and beaten by a piece of heavy
iron. Some people used one kind of a beater and some another, but we
had had made for the purpose a heavy iron club a little over a foot
long, large and heavy at one end and a handle at the other. In my
present household Maryland biscuits were never made, but I had
preserved this iron beater as a memento of my boyhood, and when the
burglaries began in our vicinity I gave it to David to keep in his
room, to be used as a weapon if necessary. I did not allow him to
have a pistol, having a regard for my own safety in a sudden night
alarm, and nothing could be more formidable in a hand-to-hand
encounter than this skull-crushing club.
I began with the tall man, and rapidly tied his feet together with
many twists of the rope and as many knots. I then turned him over
and tied his elbows behind him in the same secure way. I had given
so much thought to the best method of securing a man by cords, that I
do not think this fellow could possibly have released himself when I
had finished with him.
David was obeying my orders and keeping a strict watch on the
prostrate men; but his emotions of amazement were so great that he
could not keep them down.
"What is the matter with them, sir?" he said. "How did they come so?"
"There is no time for talking now," I answered. "I will tell you all
about it when the men have been secured." I now turned my attention
to the man who was partly resting against the lounge. I first tied
his feet, and before letting him down to the floor, so as to get to
his arms, I removed his hat and his mask, which was made of black
muslin. I was surprised to see the beardless face of a young and
very good-looking man. He was well dressed, and had the general
appearance of a person belonging to theatrical circles. When his
arms had been tied, I told David he might lay down his
biscuit-beater, and help me with the third man, who was badly mixed
up with the debris of the refreshments. We hauled him out and tied
him up. He was rather a short man, but very heavy, and I could see
no signs of his having been hurt by the smash-up he made in falling.
We now proceeded to search the insensible burglars for arms. Upon
the tall man we found a large revolver, a heavy billy, which seemed
as if it had seen service, and a long-bladed knife. The stout man
carried two double-barrelled pistols, and upon one of the fingers of
his right hand wore a brass ring with a murderous-looking iron
protuberance upon it, which, when driven forward by his powerful arm,
was probably more dangerous than a billy. Upon the younger man we
found no arms at all, and his hip pocket contained nothing but a
small handbook on civil engineering.
I now briefly explained to David the nature of the trap which had
caught the burglars. He gazed upon me with a face glowing with
amazed admiration.
"What a head you have got, sir!" he exclaimed. "I don't believe
there is another man in this State who would have thought of that.
And what are you going to do with them now, sir; hang 'em? That's
what ought to be done with them, the hounds!"
"All I shall do," I answered, "will be to keep them till daylight,
and then I shall send word to the sheriff at Kennertown, and have him
send officers for them."
"Upon my word," exclaimed David, "they are in the worst kind of a
box."
Now my wife called me again. "What in the world are you doing down
there?" she called; "why don't you come upstairs?"
This annoyed me, for I was not yet ready to go upstairs. I wished to
resuscitate these fellows, for their stupor was so profound that I
began to fear that perhaps they had taken too much of the drug and
ought to be brought to their senses as speedily as possible. This
feeling was due more to my desire that serious injuries should not
occur to the rascals while in my house than to any concern for them.
"My dear," said I, stepping to the bottom of the stairs, "I have some
things to attend to down here which will occupy me a few minutes
longer; then I will come up to you."
"I can't imagine what the things are," she said, "but I suppose I can
wait," and she went into her room and closed her door after her.
I now began to consider what was to be done with the burglars after
they had been resuscitated. My first impulse was to rid the house of
them by carrying them out of doors and bringing them to their senses
there. But there was an objection to this plan. They would be
pretty heavy fellows to carry, and as it would be absolutely
necessary to watch them until they could be given into the charge of
the officers of the law, I did not want to stay out of doors to do
this, for the night air was raw and chilly, and I therefore
determined to keep them in the house. And as they could be
resuscitated better in a sitting position, they must be set up in
some way or other. I consulted David on the subject.
"You might put 'em up with their backs agin the wall, sir," said he,
"but the dirty beasts would spoil the paper. I wouldn't keep them in
a decent room like this. I'd haul 'em out into the kitchen, anyway."
But as they were already in the library I decided to let them stay
there, and to get them as speedily as possible into some position in
which they might remain. I bethought me of a heavy wooden settle or
bench with back and arms which stood on the side piazza. With
David's help I brought this into the room and placed it with its back
to the window.
"Now, then," said I to David, "we will put them on this bench, and I
will tie them fast to it. We cannot be too careful in securing them,
for if one of them were to get loose, even without arms, there is no
knowing what trouble he might make."
"Well, sir," said David, "if I'm to handle them at all, I'd rather
have been dead, as I hope they are, than have them alive; but you
needn't be afraid, sir, that any one of them will get loose. If I
see any signs of that I'll crack the rascal's skull in a jiffy."
It required a great deal of tugging and lifting to get those three
men on the bench, but we got them there side by side, their heads
hanging listlessly, some one way, some another. I then tied each one
of them firmly to the bench.
I had scarcely finished this when I again heard my wife's voice from
the top of the stairs.
"If any pipes have burst," she called down, "tell David not to catch
the water in the new milk-pans."
"Very well," I replied, "I'll see to it," and was rejoiced to hear
again the shutting of the bedroom door.
I now saturated a sponge with the powerful preparation which Dr.
Marks had prepared as an antidote, and held it under the nose of the
tall burglar. In less than twenty seconds he made a slight quivering
in his face as if he were about to sneeze, and very soon he did
sneeze slightly. Then he sneezed violently, raised his head, and
opened his eyes. For a moment he gazed blankly before him, and then
looked stupidly at David and at me. But in an instant there flashed
into his face the look of a wild beast. His quick, glittering eye
took in the whole situation at a glance. With a furious oath he
threw himself forward with such a powerful movement that he nearly
lifted the bench.
"Stop that," said David, who stood near him with his iron club
uplifted. "If you do that again I'll let you feel this."
The man looked at him with a fiery flash in his eyes, and then he
looked at me, as I stood holding the muzzle of my pistol within two
feet of his face. The black and red faded out of his countenance.
He became pale. He glanced at his companions bound and helpless.
His expression now changed entirely. The fury of the wild beast was
succeeded by a look of frightened subjection. Gazing very anxiously
at my pistol, he said, in a voice which, though agitated, was low and
respectful:
"What does this mean? What are you going to do? Will you please
turn away the muzzle of that pistol?"
I took no notice of this indication of my steadiness of hand, and
answered:
"I am going to bring these other scoundrels to their senses, and
early in the morning the three of you will be on your way to jail,
where I hope you may remain for the rest of your lives."
"If you don't get killed on your way there," said David, in whose
nervous hand the heavy biscuit-beater was almost as dangerous as my
pistol.
The stout man who sat in the middle of the bench was twice as long in
reviving as had been his companion, who watched the operation with
intense interest. When the burly scoundrel finally became conscious,
he sat for a few minutes gazing at the floor with a silly grin; then
he raised his head and looked first at one of his companions and then
at the other, gazed for an instant at me and David, tried to move his
feet, gave a pull at one arm and then at the other, and when he found
he was bound hard and fast, his face turned as red as fire and he
opened his mouth, whether to swear or yell I know not. I had already
closed the door, and before the man had uttered more than a
premonitory sound, David had clapped the end of his bludgeon against
his mouth.
"Taste that," he said, "and you know what you will get if you disturb
this family with any of your vile cursin' and swearin'."
"Look here," said the tall man, suddenly turning to the other with an
air of authority, "keep your mouth shut and don't speak till you're
spoken to. Mind that, now, or these gentlemen will make it the worse
for you."
David grinned as he took away his club.
"I'd gentlemen you," he said, "if I could get half a chance to do it."
The face of the heavy burglar maintained its redness, but he kept his
mouth shut.
When the younger man was restored to his senses, his full
consciousness and power of perception seemed to come to him in an
instant. His eyes flashed from right to left, he turned deadly
white, and then merely moving his arms and legs enough to make
himself aware that he was bound, he sat perfectly still and said not
a word.
I now felt that I must go and acquaint my wife with what had
happened, or otherwise she would be coming downstairs to see what was
keeping me so long. David declared that he was perfectly able to
keep guard over them, and I ran upstairs. David afterward told me
that as soon as I left the room the tall burglar endeavored to bribe
him to cut their ropes, and told him if he was afraid to stay behind
after doing this he would get him a much better situation than this
could possibly be. But as David threatened personal injury to the
speaker if he uttered another word of the kind, the tall man said no
more; but the stout man became very violent and angry, threatening
all sorts of vengeance on my unfortunate man. David said he was
beginning to get angry, when the tall man, who seemed to have much
influence over the other fellow, ordered him to keep quiet, as the
gentleman with the iron club no doubt thought he was doing right.
The young fellow never said a word.
When I told my wife that I had caught three burglars, and they were
fast bound in the library, she nearly fainted; and when I had revived
her she begged me to promise that I would not go downstairs again
until the police had carried away the horrible wretches. But I
assured her that it was absolutely necessary for me to return to the
library. She then declared that she would go with me, and if
anything happened she would share my fate. "Besides," she said, "if
they are tied fast so they can't move, I should like to see what they
look like. I never saw a burglar."
I did not wish my wife to go downstairs, but as I knew there would be
no use in objecting, I consented. She hastily dressed herself,
making me wait for her; and when she left the room she locked the
door on the sleeping George William, in order that no one should get
at him during her absence. As we passed the head of the stairs, the
door of my Aunt Martha's room opened, and there she stood, completely
dressed, with her bonnet on, and a little leather bag in her hand.
"I heard so much talking and so much going up and down stairs that I
thought I had better be ready to do whatever had to be done. Is it
fire?"
"No," said my wife; "it's three burglars tied in a bunch in the
library. I am going down to see them."
My Aunt Martha gasped, and looked as if she were going to sit down on
the floor.
"Goodness gracious!" she said, "if you're going I'll go too. I can't
let you go alone, and I never did see a burglar."
I hurried down and left the two ladies on the stairs until I was sure
everything was still safe; and when I saw that there had been no
change in the state of affairs, I told them to come down.
When my wife and Aunt Martha timidly looked in at the library door,
the effect upon them and the burglars was equally interesting. The
ladies each gave a start and a little scream, and huddled themselves
close to me, and the three burglars gazed at them with faces that
expressed more astonishment than any I had ever seen before. The
stout fellow gave vent to a smothered exclamation, and the face of
the young man flushed, but not one of them spoke.
"Are you sure they are tied fast?" whispered my Aunt Martha to me.
"Perfectly," I answered; "if I had not been sure I should not have
allowed you to come down."
Thereupon the ladies picked up courage and stepped further into the
room.
"Did you and David catch them?" asked my aunt; "and how in the world
did you do it?"
"I'll tell you all about that another time," I said, "and you had
better go upstairs as soon as you two have seen what sort of people
are these cowardly burglars who sneak or break into the houses of
respectable people at night, and rob and steal and ruin other
people's property with no more conscience or human feeling than is
possessed by the rats which steal your corn, or the polecats which
kill your chickens."
"I can scarcely believe," said Aunt Martha, "that that young man is a
real burglar."
At these words the eyes of the fellow spoken of glowed as he fixed
them on Aunt Martha, but he did not say a word, and the paleness
which had returned to his face did not change.
"Have they told you who they are?" asked my wife.
"I haven't asked them," I said. "And now don't you think you had
better go upstairs?"
"It seems to me," said Aunt Martha, "that those ropes must hurt them."
The tall man now spoke. "Indeed they do, madam," he said in a low
voice and very respectful manner, "they are very tight."
I told David to look at all the cords and see if any of them were too
tightly drawn.
"It's all nonsense, sir," said he, when he had finished the
examination; "not one of the ropes is a bit too tight. All they want
is a chance to pull out their ugly hands."
"Of course," said Aunt Martha, "if it would be unsafe to loosen the
knots I wouldn't do it. Are they to be sent to prison?"
"Yes," said I; "as soon as the day breaks I shall send down for the
police."
I now heard a slight sound at the door, and turning, saw Alice, our
maid of the house, who was peeping in at the door. Alice was a
modest girl, and quite pretty.
"I heard the noise and the talking, sir," she said, "and when I found
the ladies had gone down to see what it was, I thought I would come
too."
"And where is the cook," asked my wife; "don't she want to see
burglars?"
"Not a bit of it," answered Alice, very emphatically. "As soon as I
told her what it was she covered up her head with the bedclothes and
declared, ma'am, that she would never get up until they were entirely
gone out of the house."
At this the stout man grinned.
"I wish you'd all cover up your heads," he said. The tall man looked
at him severely, and he said no more.
David did not move from his post near the three burglars, but he
turned toward Alice and looked at her. We knew that he had tender
feelings toward the girl, and I think that he did not approve of her
being there.
"Have they stolen anything?" asked Aunt Martha.
"They have not had any chance to take anything away," I said; and my
wife remarked that whether they had stolen anything or not, they had
made a dreadful mess on the floor, and had broken the table. They
should certainly be punished.
At this she made a motion as if she would leave the room, and an
anxious expression immediately came on the face of the tall man, who
had evidently been revolving something in his mind.
"Madam," he said, "we are very sorry that we have broken your table,
and that we have damaged some of your glass and your carpet. I
assure you, however, that nothing of the kind would have happened but
for that drugged wine, which was doubtless intended for a medicine,
and not a beverage; but weary and chilled as we were when we arrived,
madam, we were glad to partake of it, supposing it ordinary wine."
I could not help showing a little pride at the success of my scheme.
"The refreshment was intended for fellows of your class, and I am
very glad you accepted it."
The tall man did not answer me, but he again addressed my wife.
"Madam," he said, "if you ladies would remain and listen to me a few
moments, I am sure I would make you aware that there is much to
extenuate the apparent offense which I have committed to-night."
My wife did not answer him, but turning to me said, smiling, "If he
alludes to their drinking your wine he need not apologize."
The man looked at her with an expression as if her words had pained
him.
"Madam," he said, "if you consent to listen to my explanations and
the story of this affair, I am sure your feelings toward me would not
be so harsh."
"Now, then," said my Aunt Martha, "if he has a story to tell he ought
to be allowed to tell it, even in a case like this. Nobody should be
judged until he has said what he thinks he ought to say. Let us hear
his story."
I laughed. "Any statement he may make," I said, "will probably
deserve a much stronger name than stories."
"I think that what you say is true," remarked my wife; "but still if
he has a story to tell I should like to hear it."
I think I heard David give a little grunt; but he was too well bred
to say anything.
"Very well," said I, "if you choose to sit up and hear him talk, it
is your affair. I shall be obliged to remain here anyway, and will
not object to anything that will help to pass away the time. But
these men must not be the only ones who are seated. David, you and
Alice can clear away that broken table and the rest of the stuff, and
then we might as well sit down and make ourselves comfortable."
Alice, with cloth and brush, approached very timidly the scene of the
disaster; but the younger burglar, who was nearest to her, gazed upon
her with such a gentle and quiet air that she did not seem to be
frightened. When she and David had put the room in fair order, I
placed two easychairs for my wife and Aunt Martha at a moderate
distance from the burglars, and took another myself a little nearer
to them, and then told David to seat himself near the other end of
the bench, and Alice took a chair at a little distance from the
ladies.
"Now, then," said Aunt Martha to the burglars, "I would like very
much to hear what any one of you can say in extenuation of having
broken into a gentleman's house by night."
Without hesitation the tall man began his speech. He had a long and
rather lean, close-shaven face, which at present bore the expression
of an undertaker conducting a funeral. Although it was my aunt who
had shown the greatest desire to hear his story, he addressed himself
to my wife. I think he imagined that she was the more influential
person of the two.
"Madam," said he, "I am glad of the opportunity of giving you and
your family an idea of the difficulties and miseries which beset a
large class of your fellow-beings of whom you seldom have any chance
of knowing anything at all, but of whom you hear all sorts of the
most misleading accounts. Now, I am a poor man. I have suffered the
greatest miseries that poverty can inflict. I am here, suspected of
having committed a crime. It is possible that I may be put to
considerable difficulty and expense in proving my innocence."
"I shouldn't wonder," I interrupted. To this remark he paid no
attention.
"Considering all this," he continued, "you may not suppose, madam,
that as a boy I was brought up most respectably and properly. My
mother was a religious woman, and my father was a boat-builder. I
was sent to school, and my mother has often told me that I was a good
scholar. But she died when I was about sixteen, and I am sure had
this not happened I should never have been even suspected of breaking
the laws of my country. Not long after her death my father appeared
to lose interest in his business, and took to rowing about the river
instead of building boats for other people to row. Very often he
went out at night, and I used to wonder why he should care to be on
the water in the darkness, and sometimes in the rain. One evening at
supper he said to me: 'Thomas, you ought to know how to row in the
dark as well as in the daytime. I am going up the river to-night,
and you can come with me.'
"It was about my ordinary bedtime when we took a boat with two pair
of oars, and we pulled up the river about three miles above the city."
"What city?" I asked.
"The city where I was born, sir," he said, "and the name of which I
must be excused from mentioning for reasons connected with my only
surviving parent. There were houses on the river bank, but they were
not very near each other. Some of them had lights in them, but most
of them were dark, as it must have been after eleven o'clock. Before
one of them my father stopped rowing for a moment and looked at it
pretty hard. It seemed to be all dark, but as we pulled on a little
I saw a light in the back of the house.
"My father said nothing, but we kept on, though pulling very easy for
a mile or two, and then we turned and floated down with the tide.
'You might as well rest, Thomas,' said he, 'for you have worked
pretty hard.'
"We floated slowly, for the tide was just beginning to turn, and when
we got near the house which I mentioned, I noticed that there was no
light in it. When we were about opposite to it father suddenly
looked up and said, not speaking very loud, 'By George! if that isn't
Williamson Green's house. I wasn't thinking of it when we rowed up,
and passed it without taking notice of it. I am sorry for that, for
I wanted to see Williamson, and now I expect he has gone to bed.'
"'Who is Mr. Green?' I asked.
"'He is an old friend of mine,' said my father, 'and I haven't seen
him for some little while now. About four months ago he borrowed of
me a sextant, quadrant, and chronometer. They were instruments I
took from old Captain Barney in payment of some work I did for him.
I wasn't usin' them, and Williamson had bought a catboat and was
studying navigation; but he has given up that fad now and has
promised me over and over to send me back my instruments, but he has
never done it. If I'd thought of it I would have stopped and got 'em
of him; but I didn't think, and now I expect he has gone to bed.
However, I'll row in shore and see; perhaps he's up yet.'
"You see, ma'am," said the speaker to my wife, "I'm tellin' you all
these particulars because I am very anxious you should understand
exactly how everything happened on this night, which was the
turning-point of my life."
"Very good," said Aunt Martha; "we want to hear all the particulars."
"Well, then," continued the burglar, "we pulled up to a stone wall
which was at the bottom of Green's place and made fast, and father he
got out and went up to the house. After a good while he came back
and said that he was pretty sure Williamson Green had gone to bed,
and as it wouldn't do to waken people up from their sleep to ask them
for nautical instruments they had borrowed, he sat down for a minute
on the top of the wall, and then he slapped his knee, not making much
noise, though.
"'By George!' he said, 'an idea has just struck me. I can play the
prettiest trick on Williamson that ever was played on mortal man.
Those instruments are all in a box locked up, and I know just where
he keeps it. I saw it not long ago, when I went to his house to talk
about a yacht he wants built. They are on a table in the corner of
his bedroom. He was taking me through the house to show me the
improvements he had made, and he said to me:
"'"Martin, there's your instruments. I won't trouble you to take
them with you, because they're heavy and you're not going straight
home, but I'll bring them to you day after to-morrow, when I shall be
goin' your way."
"'Now, then,' said my father, 'the trick I'm thinkin' of playing on
Williamson is this: I'd like to take that box of instruments out of
his room without his knowing it and carry them home, having the boat
here convenient; and then in a day or two to write to him and tell
him I must have 'em, because I have a special use for 'em. Of course
he'll be awfully cut up, not having them to send back; and when he
comes down to my place to talk about it, and after hearing all he has
to say, I'll show him the box. He'll be the most dumbfoundedest man
in this State; and if I don't choose to tell him he'll never know to
his dying day how I got the box. And if he lies awake at night,
trying to think how I got it, it will serve him right for keeping my
property from me so long.'
"'But, father,' said I, 'if the people have gone to bed you can't get
into the house to play him your trick.'
"'That can be managed,' says he; 'I'm rather old for climbing myself,
but I know a way by which you, Thomas, can get in easy enough. At
the back of the house is a trellis with a grape-vine running over it,
and the top of it is just under one of the second-story windows. You
can climb up that trellis, Thomas, and lift up that window-sash very
carefully, so's not to make no noise, and get in. Then you'll be in
a back room, with a door right in front of you which opens into Mr.
and Mrs. Green's bedroom. There's always a little night lamp burning
in it, by which you can see to get about. In the corner, on your
right as you go into the room, is a table with my instrument-box
standing on it. The box is pretty heavy, and there is a handle on
top to carry it by. You needn't be afraid to go in, for by this time
they are both sound asleep, and you can pick up the box and walk out
as gingerly as a cat, having of course taken your shoes off before
you went in. Then you can hand the box out the back window to me--I
can climb up high enough to reach it--and you can scuttle down, and
we'll be off, having the best rig on Williamson Green that I ever
heard of in my born days.'
"I was a very active boy, used to climbing and all that sort of
thing, and I had no doubt that I could easily get into the house; but
I did not fancy my father's scheme.
"'Suppose,' I said, 'that Mr. Williamson Green should wake up and see
me; what could I say? How could I explain my situation?'
"'You needn't say anything,' said my father. 'If he wakes up blow
out the light and scoot. If you happen to have the box in your hand
drop it out the back window and then slip down after it. He won't
see us; but if he does he cannot catch us before we get to the boat;
but if he should, however, I'll have to explain the matter to him,
and the joke will be against me; but I shall get my instruments,
which is the main point, after all.'
"I did not argue with my father, for he was a man who hated to be
differed with, and I agreed to help him carry out his little joke.
We took off our shoes and walked quietly to the back of the house.
My father stood below, and I climbed up the trellis under the back
window, which he pointed out. The window-sash was down all but a
little crack to let in air, and I raised it so slowly and gently that
I made no noise. Then without any trouble at all I got into the room.
"I found myself in a moderate-sized chamber, into which a faint light
came from a door opposite the window. Having been several hours out
in the night my eyes had become so accustomed to darkness that this
light was comparatively strong and I could see everything.
"Looking about me my eyes fell on a little bedstead, on which lay one
of the most beautiful infants I ever beheld in my life. Its golden
hair lay in ringlets upon the pillow. Its eyes were closed, but its
soft cheeks had in them a rosy tinge which almost equalled the color
of its dainty little lips, slightly opened as it softly breathed and
dreamed." At this point I saw my wife look quickly at the bedroom
key she had in her hand. I knew she was thinking of George William.
"I stood entranced," continued the burglar, "gazing upon this babe,
for I was very fond of children; but I remembered that I must not
waste time, and stepped softly into the next room. There I beheld
Mr. and Mrs. Williamson Green in bed, both fast asleep, the gentleman
breathing a little hard. In a corner, just where my father told me I
should find it, stood the box upon the table.
"But I could not immediately pick it up and depart. The beautiful
room in which I found myself was a revelation to me. Until that
moment I had not known that I had tastes and sympathies of a higher
order than might have been expected of the youthful son of a
boat-builder. Those artistic furnishings aroused within a love of
the beautiful which I did not know I possessed. The carpets, the
walls, the pictures, the hangings in the windows, the furniture, the
ornaments--everything, in fact, impressed me with such a delight that
I did not wish to move or go away.
"Into my young soul there came a longing. 'Oh!' I said to myself,
'that my parents had belonged to the same social grade as that worthy
couple reposing in that bed; and oh! that I, in my infancy, had been
as beautiful and as likely to be so carefully nurtured and cultured
as that sweet babe in the next room.' I almost heaved a sigh as I
thought of the difference between these surroundings and my own, but
I checked myself; it would not do to make a noise and spoil my
father's joke.
"There were a great many things in that luxurious apartment which it
would have delighted me to look upon and examine, but I forebore.
"I wish I'd been there," said the stout man; "there wouldn't have
been any forbearin'."
The speaker turned sharply upon him.
"Don't you interrupt me again," he said angrily. Then, instantly
resuming his deferential tone, he continued the story.
"But I had come there by the command of my parent, and this command
must be obeyed without trifling or loss of time. My father did not
approve of trifling or loss of time. I moved quietly toward the
table in the corner, on which stood my father's box. I was just
about to put my hand upon it when I heard a slight movement behind
me. I gave a start and glanced backward. It was Mr. Williamson
Green turning over in his bed; what if he should awake? His back was
now toward me, and my impulse was to fly and leave everything behind
me; but my father had ordered me to bring the box, and he expected
his orders to be obeyed. I had often been convinced of that.
"I stood perfectly motionless for a minute or so, and when the
gentleman recommenced his regular and very audible breathing I felt
it safe to proceed with my task. Taking hold of the box I found it
was much heavier than I expected it to be; but I moved gently away
with it and passed into the back room.
"There I could not refrain from stopping a moment by the side of the
sleeping babe, upon whose cherub-like face the light of the night
lamp dimly shone. The little child was still sleeping sweetly, and
my impulse was to stop and kiss it; but I knew that this would be
wrong. The infant might awake and utter a cry and my father's joke
be spoiled. I moved to the open window, and with some trouble, and,
I think, without any noise, I succeeded in getting out upon the
trellis with the box under my arm. The descent was awkward, but my
father was a tall man, and, reaching upward, relieved me of my burden
before I got to the ground.
"'I didn't remember it was so heavy,' he whispered, 'or I should have
given you a rope to lower it down by. If you had dropped it and
spoiled my instruments, and made a lot of noise besides, I should
have been angry enough.'
"I was very glad my father was not angry, and following him over the
greensward we quickly reached the boat, where the box was stowed away
under the bow to keep it from injury.
"We pushed off as quietly as possible and rowed swiftly down the
river. When we had gone about a mile I suddenly dropped my oar with
an exclamation of dismay.
"'What's the matter?' cried my father.
"'Oh, I have done a dreadful thing!' I said. 'Oh, father, I must go
back!'
"I am sorry to say that at this my father swore.
"'What do you want to go back for?' he said.
"'Just to think of it! I have left open the window in which that
beautiful child was sleeping. If it should take cold and die from
the damp air of the river blowing upon it I should never forgive
myself. Oh, if I had only thought of climbing up the trellis again
and pulling down that sash! I am sure I could go back and do it
without making the least noise.' My father gave a grunt; but what
the grunt meant I do not know, and for a few moments he was silent,
and then he said:
"'Thomas, you cannot go back; the distance is too great, the tide is
against us, and it is time that you and I were both in our beds.
Nothing may happen to that baby; but, attend to my words now, if any
harm should come to that child it will go hard with you. If it
should die it would be of no use for you to talk about practical
jokes. You would be held responsible for its death. I was going to
say to you that it might be as well for you not to say anything about
this little venture until I had seen how Williamson Green took the
joke. Some people get angry with very little reason, although I
hardly believe he's that sort of a man; but now things are different.
He thinks all the world of that child, which is the only one they've
got; and if you want to stay outside of jail or the house of refuge I
warn you never to say a word of where you have been this night.'
"With this he began to row again, and I followed his example, but
with a very heavy heart. All that night I dreamt of the little child
with the damp night winds blowing in upon it."
"Did you ever hear if it caught cold?" asked Aunt Martha.
"No," replied the burglar, "I never did. I mentioned the matter to
my father, and he said that he had great fears upon the subject, for
although he had written to Williamson Green, asking him to return the
instruments, he had not seen him or heard from him, and he was afraid
that the child had died or was dangerously sick. Shortly after that
my father sent me on a little trip to the Long Island coast to
collect some bills from people for whom he had done work. He gave me
money to stay a week or two at the seashore, saying that the change
would do me good; and it was while I was away on this delightful
holiday that an event occurred which had a most disastrous effect
upon my future life. My father was arrested for burglary!
"It appeared--and I cannot tell you how shocked I was when I
discovered the truth:--that the box which I had carried away did not
contain nautical instruments, but was filled with valuable plate and
jewels. My unfortunate father heard from a man who had been
discharged from the service of the family whose house he had
visited--whose name, by the way, was not Green--where the box
containing the valuables mentioned was always placed at night, and he
had also received accurate information in regard to the situation of
the rooms and the best method of gaining access to them.
"I believe that some arrangement had been made between my father and
this discharged servant in regard to a division of the contents of
the box, and it was on account of a disagreement on this subject that
the man became very angry, and after pocketing what my father thought
was his fair share he departed to unknown regions, leaving behind a
note to the police which led to my father's arrest."
"That was a mean trick," said Aunt Martha.
The burglar looked at her gratefully.
"In the lower spheres of life, madam, such things often happen. Some
of the plate and jewels were found in my father's possession, and he
was speedily tried and sentenced to a long term of imprisonment. And
now, can you imagine, ladies," said the tall burglar, apparently
having become satisfied to address himself to Aunt Martha as well as
my wife, "the wretched position in which I found myself? I was
upbraided as the son of a thief. I soon found myself without home,
without occupation, and, alas! without good reputation. I was
careful not to mention my voluntary connection with my father's crime
for fear that should I do so I might be compelled to make a statement
which might increase the severity of his punishment. For this reason
I did not dare to make inquiries concerning the child in whom I had
taken such an interest, and whose little life I had, perhaps,
imperilled. I never knew, ladies, whether that infant grew up or not.
"But I, alas! grew up to a life of hardship and degradation. It
would be impossible for persons in your sphere of life to understand
what I now was obliged to suffer. Suitable employment I could not
obtain, because I was the son of a burglar. With a father in the
State prison it was of no use for me to apply for employment at any
respectable place of business. I labored at one thing and another,
sometimes engaging in the most menial employments. I also had been
educated and brought up by my dear mother for a very different
career. Sometimes I managed to live fairly well, sometimes I
suffered. Always I suffered from the stigma of my father's crime;
always in the eyes of the community in which I lived--a community, I
am sorry to say, incapable, as a rule, of making correct judgments in
delicate cases like these--I was looked upon as belonging to the
ranks of the dishonest. It was a hard lot, and sometimes almost
impossible to bear up under.
"I have spoken at length, ladies, in order that you may understand my
true position; and I wish to say that I have never felt the crushing
weight of my father's disgrace more deeply than I felt it last
evening. This man," nodding toward the stout burglar, "came to me
shortly after I had eaten my supper, which happened to be a frugal
one, and said to me:
"'Thomas, I have some business to attend to to-night, in which you
can help me if you choose. I know you are a good mechanic.'
"'If it is work that will pay me,' I answered, 'I should be very glad
to do it, for I am greatly in need of money.'
"'It will pay,' said he; and I agreed to assist him.
"As we were walking to the station, as the business to be attended to
was out of town, this man, whose name is James Barlow, talked to me
in such a way that I began to suspect that he intended to commit a
burglary, and openly charged him with this evil purpose. 'You may
call it burglary or anything else you please,' said he; 'property is
very unequally divided in this world, and it is my business in life
to make wrong things right as far as I can. I am going to the house
of a man who has a great deal more than he needs, and I haven't
anything like as much as I need; and so I intend to take some of his
overplus--not very much, for when I leave his house he will still be
a rich man, and I'll be a poor one. But for a time my family will
not starve.'
"'Argue as you please, James Barlow,' I said, 'what you are going to
do is nothing less than burglary.'
"'Of course it is,' said he; 'but it's all right, all the same.
There are a lot of people, Thomas, who are not as particular about
these things as they used to be, and there is no use for you to seem
better than your friends and acquaintances. Now, to show there are
not so many bigots as there used to be, there's a young man going to
meet us at the station who is greatly interested in the study of
social problems. He is going along with us just to look into this
sort of thing and study it. It is impossible for him to understand
people of our class, or do anything to make their condition better,
if he does not thoroughly investigate their methods of life and
action. He's going along just as a student, nothing more; and he may
be down on the whole thing for all I know. He pays me five dollars
for the privilege of accompanying me, and whether he likes it or not
is his business. I want you to go along as a mechanic, and if your
conscience won't let you take any share in the profit, I'll just pay
you for your time.'
"'James Barlow,' said I, 'I am going with you, but for a purpose far
different from that you desire. I shall keep by your side, and if I
can dissuade you from committing the crime you intend I shall do so;
but if I fail in this, and you deliberately break into a house for
purposes of robbery, I shall arouse the inmates and frustrate your
crime.' Now, James Barlow," said he, turning to the stout man with a
severe expression on his strongly marked face, "is not what I have
said perfectly true? Did you not say to me every word which I have
just repeated?"
The stout man looked at the other in a very odd way. His face seemed
to broaden and redden, and he merely closed his eyes as he promptly
answered:
"That's just what I said, every blasted word of it. You've told it
fair and square, leavin' off nothin' and puttin' in nothin'. You've
told the true facts out and out, up and down, without a break."
"Now, ladies," continued the tall man, "you see my story is
corroborated, and I will conclude it by saying that when this house,
in spite of my protest, had been opened, I entered with the others
with the firm intention of stepping into a hallway or some other
suitable place and announcing in a loud voice that the house was
about to be robbed. As soon as I found the family aroused and my
purpose accomplished, I intended to depart as quickly as possible,
for, on account of the shadow cast upon me by my father's crime, I
must never be found even in the vicinity of criminal action. But as
I was passing through this room I could not resist the invitation of
Barlow to partake of the refreshments which we saw upon the table. I
was faint from fatigue and insufficient nourishment. It seemed a
very little thing to taste a drop of wine in a house where I was
about to confer a great benefit. I yielded to the temptation, and
now I am punished. Partaking even that little which did not belong
to me, I find myself placed in my present embarrassing position."
"You are right there," said I, "it must be embarrassing; but before
we have any more reflections, there are some practical points about
which I wish you would inform me. How did that wicked man, Mr.
Barlow I think you called him, get into this house?"
The tall man looked at me for a moment, as if in doubt what he should
say; and then his expression of mingled hopelessness and contrition
changed into one of earnest frankness.
"I will tell you, sir, exactly," he said; "I have no wish to conceal
anything. I have long wanted to have an opportunity to inform
occupants of houses, especially those in the suburbs, of the
insufficiency of their window fastenings. Familiar with mechanic
devices as I am, and accustomed to think of such things, the
precautions of householders sometimes move me to laughter. Your
outer doors, front and back, are of heavy wood, chained, locked, and
bolted, often double locked and bolted; but your lower windows are
closed in the first place by the lightest kind of shutters, which are
very seldom fastened at all, and in the second place by a little
contrivance connecting the two sashes, which is held in place by a
couple of baby screws. If these contrivances are of the best kind
and cannot be opened from the outside with a knife-blade or piece of
tin, the burglar puts a chisel or jimmy under the lower sash and
gently presses it upward, when the baby screws come out as easily as
if they were babies' milk-teeth. Not for a moment does the burglar
trouble himself about the front door, with its locks and chains and
bolts. He goes to the window, with its baby screws, which might as
well be left open as shut, for all the hindrance it is to his
entrance; and if he meddled with the door at all, it is simply to
open it from the inside, so that when he is ready to depart he may do
so easily."
"But all that does not apply to my windows," I said. "They are not
fastened that way."
"No, sir," said the man, "your lower shutters are solid and strong as
your doors. This is right, for if shutters are intended to obstruct
entrance to a house they should be as strong as the doors. When
James Barlow first reached this house he tried his jimmy on one of
the shutters in this main building, but he could not open it. The
heavy bolt inside was too strong for him. Then he tried another near
by with the same result. You will find the shutters splintered at
the bottom. Then he walked to the small addition at the back of the
house, where the kitchen is located. Here the shutters were smaller,
and of course the inside bolts were smaller. Everything in harmony.
Builders are so careful now-a-days to have everything in harmony.
When Barlow tried his jimmy on one of these shutters the bolt
resisted for a time, but its harmonious proportions caused it to
bend, and it was soon drawn from its staples and the shutter opened,
and of course the sash was opened as I told you sashes are opened."
"Well," said I, "shutters and sashes of mine shall never be opened in
that way again."
"It was with that object that I spoke to you," said the tall man. "I
wish you to understand the faults of your fastenings, and any
information I can give you which will better enable you to protect
your house, I shall be glad to give, as a slight repayment for the
injury I may have helped to do to you in the way of broken glass and
spoiled carpet. I have made window fastenings an especial study,
and, if you employ me for the purpose, I'll guarantee that I will put
your house into a condition which will be absolutely burglar proof.
If I do not do this to your satisfaction, I will not ask to be paid a
cent."
"We will not consider that proposition now," I said, "for you may
have other engagements which would interfere with the proposed job."
I was about to say that I thought we had enough of this sort of
story, when Aunt Martha interrupted me.
"It seems to me," she said, speaking to the tall burglar, "that you
have instincts, and perhaps convictions, of what is right and proper;
but it is plain that you allow yourself to be led and influenced by
unprincipled companions. You should avoid even the outskirts of
evil. You may not know that the proposed enterprise is a bad one,
but you should not take part in it unless you know that it is a good
one. In such cases you should be rigid."
The man turned toward my aunt, and looked steadfastly at her, and as
he gazed his face grew sadder and sadder.
"Rigid," he repeated; "that is hard."
"Yes," I remarked, "that is one of the meanings of the word."
Paying no attention to me, he continued:
"Madam," said he, with a deep pathos in his voice, "no one can be
better aware than I am that I have made many mistakes in the course
of my life; but that quality on which I think I have reason to be
satisfied with myself is my rigidity when I know a thing is wrong.
There occurs to me now an instance in my career which will prove to
you what I say.
"I knew a man by the name of Spotkirk, who had invented a liniment
for the cure of boils. He made a great success with his liniment,
which he called Boilene, and at the time I speak of he was a very
rich man.
"One day Spotkirk came to me and told me he wanted me to do a piece
of business for him, for which he would pay me twenty-five dollars.
I was glad to hear this, for I was greatly in need of money, and I
asked him what it was he wanted me to do.
"'You know Timothy Barker,' said he. 'Well, Timothy and I have had a
misunderstanding, and I want you to be a referee or umpire between
us, to set things straight.'
"'Very good,' said I, 'and what is the point of difference?'
"'I'll put the whole thing before you,' said he, 'for of course you
must understand it or you can't talk properly to Timothy. Now, you
see, in the manufacture of my Boilene I need a great quantity of good
yellow gravel, and Timothy Barker has got a gravel pit of that kind.
Two years ago I agreed with Timothy that he should furnish me with
all the gravel I should want for one-eighth of one per cent. of the
profits on the Boilene. We didn't sign no papers, for which I am
sorry, but that was the agreement; and now Timothy says that
one-eighth of one per cent. isn't enough. He has gone wild about it,
and actually wants ten per cent., and threatens to sue me if I don't
give it to him.'
"'Are you obliged to have gravel? Wouldn't something else do for
your purpose?'
"'There's nothing as cheap,' said Spotkirk. 'You see I have to have
lots and lots of it. Every day I fill a great tank with the gravel
and let water onto it. This soaks through the gravel, and comes out
a little pipe in the bottom of the tank of a beautiful yellow color;
sometimes it is too dark, and then I have to thin it with more water.'
"'Then you bottle it,' I said.
"'Yes,' said Spotkirk; 'then there is all the expense and labor of
bottling it.'
"'Then you put nothing more into it,' said I.
"'What more goes into it before it's corked,' said Spotkirk, 'is my
business. That's my secret, and nobody's been able to find it out.
People have had Boilene analyzed by chemists, but they can't find out
the hidden secret of its virtue. There's one thing that everybody
who has used it does know, and that is that it is a sure cure for
boils. If applied for two or three days according to directions, and
at the proper stage, the boil is sure to disappear. As a proof of
its merit I have sold seven hundred and forty-eight thousand bottles
this year.'
"'At a dollar a bottle?' said I.
"'That is the retail price,' said he.
"'Now, then, Mr. Spotkirk,' said I, 'it will not be easy to convince
Timothy Barker that one-eighth of one per cent. is enough for him. I
suppose he hauls his gravel to your factory?'
"'Hauling's got nothing to do with it,' said he; 'gravel is only ten
cents a load anywhere, and if I choose I could put my factory right
in the middle of a gravel pit. Timothy Barker has nothing to
complain of.
"'But he knows you are making a lot of money,' said I, 'and it will
be a hard job to talk him over. Mr. Spotkirk, it's worth every cent
of fifty dollars.'
"'Now look here,' said he; 'if you get Barker to sign a paper that
will suit me, I'll give you fifty dollars. I'd rather do that than
have him bring a suit. If the matter comes up in the courts those
rascally lawyers will be trying to find out what I put into my
Boilene, and that sort of thing would be sure to hurt my business.
It won't be so hard to get a hold on Barker if you go to work the
right way. You can just let him understand that you know all about
that robbery at Bonsall's clothing-store, where he kept the stolen
goods in his barn, covered up with hay, for nearly a week. It would
be a good thing for Timothy Barker to understand that somebody else
beside me knows about that business, and if you bring it in right, it
will fetch him around, sure.'
"I kept quiet for a minute or two, and then I said:
"'Mr. Spotkirk, this is an important business. I can't touch it
under a hundred dollars.' He looked hard at me, and then he said:
"'Do it right, and a hundred dollars is yours.'
"After that I went to see Timothy Barker, and had a talk with him.
Timothy was boiling over, and considered himself the worst-cheated
man in the world. He had only lately found out how Spotkirk made his
Boilene, and what a big sale he had for it, and he was determined to
have more of the profits.
"'Just look at it!' he shouted; 'when Spotkirk has washed out my
gravel it's worth more than it was before, and he sells it for
twenty-five cents a load to put on gentlemen's places. Even out of
that he makes a hundred and fifty per cent. profit.'
"I talked a good deal more with Timothy Barker, and found out a good
many things about Spotkirk's dealings with him, and then in an
off-hand manner I mentioned the matter of the stolen goods in his
barn, just as if I had known all about it from the very first. At
this Timothy stopped shouting, and became as meek as a mouse. He
said nobody was as sorry as he was when he found the goods concealed
in his barn had been stolen, and that if he had known it before the
thieves took them away he should have informed the authorities; and
then he went on to tell me how he got so poor and so hard up by
giving his whole time to digging and hauling gravel for Spotkirk, and
neglecting his little farm, that he did not know what was going to
become of him and his family if he couldn't make better terms with
Spotkirk for the future, and he asked me very earnestly to help him
in this business if I could.
"Now, then, I set myself to work to consider this business. Here was
a rich man oppressing a poor one, and here was this rich man offering
me one hundred dollars--which in my eyes was a regular fortune--to
help him get things so fixed that he could keep on oppressing the
poor one. Now, then, here was a chance for me to show my principles.
Here was a chance for me to show myself what you, madam, call rigid;
and rigid I was. I just set that dazzling one hundred dollars aside,
much as I wanted it. Much as I actually needed it, I wouldn't look
at it, or think of it. I just said to myself, 'If you can do any
good in this matter, do it for the poor man;' and I did do it for
Timothy Barker with his poor wife and seven children, only two of
them old enough to help him in the gravel pit. I went to Spotkirk
and I talked to him, and I let him see that if Timothy Barker showed
up the Boilene business, as he threatened to do, it would be a bad
day for the Spotkirk family. He tried hard to talk me over to his
side, but I was rigid, madam, I was rigid, and the business ended in
my getting seven per cent. of the profits of Boilene for that poor
man, Timothy Barker, and his large family; and their domestic
prosperity is entirely due--I say it without hesitation--to my
efforts on their behalf, and to my rigidity in standing up for the
poor against the rich."
"Of course," I here remarked, "you don't care to mention anything
about the money you squeezed out of Timothy Barker by means of your
knowledge that he had been a receiver of stolen goods, and I suppose
the Boilene man gave you something to get the percentage brought down
from ten per cent. to seven."
The tall burglar turned and looked at me with an air of saddened
resignation.
"Of course," said he, "it is of no use for a man in my position to
endeavor to set himself right in the eyes of one who is prejudiced
against him. My hope is that those present who are not prejudiced
will give my statements the consideration they deserve."
"Which they certainly will do," I continued. Turning to my wife and
Aunt Martha, "As you have heard this fine story, I think it is time
for you to retire."
"I do not wish to retire," promptly returned Aunt Martha. "I was
never more awake in my life, and couldn't go asleep if I tried. What
we have heard may or may not be true, but it furnishes subjects for
reflection--serious reflection. I wish very much to hear what that
man in the middle of the bench has to say for himself; I am sure he
has a story."
"Yes, ma'am," said the stout man, with animation. "I've got one, and
I'd like nothin' better than to tell it to you if you'll give me a
little somethin' to wet my lips with--a little beer, or whiskey and
water, or anything you have convenient."
"Whiskey and water!" said Aunt Martha with severity. "I should think
not. It seems to me you have had all the intoxicating liquors in
this house that you would want."
"But I don't think you're the kind of person who'd doctor the liquor.
This is the first gentleman's house where I ever found anything of
that kind."
"The worse for the gentleman," I remarked. The man grunted.
"Well, ma'am," he said, "call it anything you please--milk, cider,
or, if you have nothin' else, I'll take water. I can't talk without
somethin' soaky."
My wife rose. "If we are to listen to another story," she said, "I
want something to keep up my strength. I shall go into the
dining-room and make some tea, and Aunt Martha can give these men
some of that if she likes."
The ladies now left the room, followed by Alice. Presently they
called me, and, leaving the burglars in charge of the vigilant David,
I went to them. I found them making tea.
"I have been upstairs to see if George William is all right, and now
I want you to tell me what you think of that man's story," said my
wife.
"I don't think it a story at all," said I. "I call it a lie. A
story is a relation which purports to be fiction, no matter how much
like truth it may be, and is intended to be received as fiction. A
lie is a false statement made with the intention to deceive, and that
is what I believe we have heard to-night."
"I agree with you exactly," said my wife.
"It may be," said Aunt Martha, "that the man's story is true. There
are some things about it which make me think so; but if he is really
a criminal he must have had trials and temptations which led him into
his present mode of life. We should consider that."
"I have been studying him," I said, "and I think he is a born rascal,
who ought to have been hung long ago."
My aunt looked at me. "John," she said, "if you believe people are
born criminals, they ought to be executed in their infancy. It could
be done painlessly by electricity, and society would be the gainer,
although you lawyers would be the losers. But I do not believe in
your doctrine. If the children of the poor were properly brought up
and educated, fewer of them would grow to be criminals."
"I don't think this man suffered for want of education," said my
wife; "he used very good language; that was one of the first things
that led me to suspect him. It is not likely that sons of
boat-builders speak so correctly and express themselves so well."
"Of course, I cannot alter your opinions," said Aunt Martha, "but the
story interested me, and I very much wish to hear what that other man
has to say for himself."
"Very well," said I, "you shall hear it; but I must drink my tea and
go back to the prisoners."
"And I," said Aunt Martha, "will take some tea to them. They may be
bad men, but they must not suffer."
I had been in the library but a few moments when Aunt Martha entered,
followed by Alice, who bore a tray containing three very large cups
of tea and some biscuit.
"Now, then," said Aunt Martha to me, "if you will untie their hands,
I will give them some tea."
At these words each burglar turned his eyes on me with a quick
glance. I laughed.
"Hardly," said I. "I would not be willing to undertake the task of
tying them up again, unless, indeed, they will consent to drink some
more of my wine."
"Which we won't do," said the middle burglar, "and that's flat."
"Then they must drink this tea with their hands tied," said Aunt
Martha, in a tone of reproachful resignation, and, taking a cup from
the tray, she approached the stout man and held it up to his lips.
At this act of extreme kindness we were all amused, even the
burglar's companions smiled, and David so far forgot himself as to
burst into a laugh, which, however, he quickly checked. The stout
burglar, however, saw nothing to laugh at. He drank the tea, and
never drew breath until the cup was emptied.
"I forgot," said my aunt, as she removed the cup from his lips, "to
ask you whether you took much or little sugar."
"Don't make no difference to me," answered the man; "tea isn't malt
liquor; it's poor stuff any way, and it doesn't matter to me whether
it's got sugar in it or not, but it's moistenin', and that's what I
want. Now, madam, I'll just say to you, if ever I break into a room
where you're sleepin', I'll see that you don't come to no harm, even
if you sit up in bed and holler."
"Thank you," said Aunt Martha; "but I hope you will never again be
concerned in that sort of business."
He grinned. "That depends on circumstances," said he.
Aunt Martha now offered the tall man some tea, but he thanked her
very respectfully, and declined. The young man also said that he did
not care for tea, but that if the maid--looking at Alice--would give
him a glass of water he would be obliged. This was the first time he
had spoken. His voice was low and of a pleasing tone. David's face
grew dark, and we could see that he objected to this service from
Alice.
"I will give him the water myself," said Aunt Martha. This she did,
and I noticed that the man's thirst was very soon satisfied. When
David had been refreshed, and biscuits refused by the burglars, who
could not very well eat them with their hands tied, we all sat down,
and the stout man began his story. I give it as he told it, omitting
some coarse and rough expressions, and a good deal of slang which
would be unintelligible to the general reader.
"There's no use," said the burglar, "for me to try and make any of
you believe that I'm a pious gentleman under a cloud, for I know I
don't look like it, and wouldn't be likely to make out a case."
At this the tall man looked at him very severely.
"I don't mean to say," he continued, "that my friend here tried
anything like that. Every word he said was perfectly true, as I
could personally testify if I was called upon the stand, and what I'm
goin' to tell you is likewise solid fact.
"My father was a cracksman, and a first-rate one, too; he brought me
up to the business, beginning when I was very small. I don't
remember havin' any mother, so I'll leave her out. My old man was
very particular; he liked to see things done right. One day I was
with him, and we saw a tinner nailing a new leader or tin water-spout
to the side of a house.
"'Look here, young man,' says Dad, 'you're makin' a pretty poor job
of that. You don't put in enough nails, and they ain't half drove
in. Supposin' there was a fire in that house some night, and the
family had to come down by the spout, and your nails would give way,
and they'd break their necks. What would you think then? And I can
tell you what it is, young man, I can appear ag'in you for doing poor
work.'
"The tinner grumbled, but he used more nails and drove 'em tight, Dad
and me standin' by, an' looking at him. One rainy night not long
after this Dad took me out with him and we stopped in front of this
house. 'Now, Bobbie,' said he, 'I want you to climb into that open
second-story window, and then slip downstairs and open the front door
for me; the family's at dinner.'
"'How am I to get up, Dad?' said I.
"Oh, you can go up the spout,' says he; 'I'll warrant that it will
hold you. I've seen to it that it was put on good and strong.'
"I tried it, and as far as I can remember I never went up a safer
spout."
"And you opened the front door?" asked Aunt Martha.
"Indeed I did, ma'am," said the burglar, "you wouldn't catch me
makin' no mistakes in that line.
"After a while I got too heavy to climb spouts, and I took to the
regular business, and did well at it, too."
"Do you mean to say," asked Aunt Martha, "that you willingly and
premeditatedly became a thief and midnight robber?"
"That's what I am, ma'am," said he; "I don't make no bones about it.
I'm a number one, double-extra, back-springed, copper-fastened
burglar, with all the attachments and noiseless treadle. That's what
I am, and no mistake.
"There's all kinds of businesses in this world, and there's got to be
people to work at every one of 'em; and when a fellow takes any
particular line, his business is to do it well; that's my motto.
When I break into a house I make it a point to clean it out
first-class, and not to carry away no trash, nuther. Of course, I've
had my ups and my downs, like other people--preachers and doctors and
storekeepers--they all have them, and I guess the downs are more
amusin' than the ups, at least to outsiders. I've just happened to
think of one of them, and I'll let you have it.
"There was a man I knew named Jerry Hammond, that was a contractor,
and sometimes he had pretty big jobs on hand, buildin' or road-makin'
or somethin' or other. He'd contract to do anything, would Jerry, no
matter whether he'd ever done it before or not. I got to know his
times and seasons for collecting money, and I laid for him."
"Abominable meanness!" exclaimed my wife.
"It's all business," said the stout man, quite unabashed. "You don't
catch a doctor refusin' to practice on a friend, or a lawyer, nuther,
and in our line of business it's the same thing. It was about the
end of October, nigh four years ago, that I found out that Jerry had
a lot of money on hand. He'd been collectin' it from different
parties, and had got home too late in the day to put it in the bank,
so says I to myself, this is your time, old fellow, and you'd better
make hay while the sun shines. I was a little afraid to crack
Jerry's house by myself, for he's a strong old fellow, so I got a man
named Putty Henderson to go along with me. Putty was a big fellow
and very handy with a jimmy; but he was awful contrary-minded, and he
wouldn't agree to clean out Jerry until I promised to go halves with
him. This wasn't fair, for it wasn't his job, and a quarter would
have been lots for him.
"But there wasn't no use arguin', and along we went, and about one
o'clock we was standin' alongside Jerry's bed, where he was fast
asleep. He was a bachelor, and lived pretty much by himself. I give
him a punch to waken him up, for we'd made up our minds that was the
way to work this job. It wouldn't pay us to go around huntin' for
Jerry's money. He was such a sharp old fellow, it was six to four
we'd never find it. He sat up in bed with a jump like a hop-toad,
and looked first at one and then at the other of us. We both had
masks on, and it wasn't puzzlin' to guess what we was there fur.
"'Jerry Hammond,' says I, speakin' rather rough and husky, 'we knows
that you've got a lot o' money in this house, and we've come fur it.
We mean business, and there is no use foolin'. You can give it to us
quiet and easy, and keep a whole head on your shoulders, or we'll lay
you out ready fur a wake and help ourselves to the funds; and now you
pays your money and you can take your choice how you do it. There's
nothin' shabby about us, but we mean business. Don't we,
pard?'--'That's so,' says Putty.
"'Look here,' says Jerry, jest as cool as if he had been sittin'
outside on his own curbstone, 'I know you two men and no mistake.
You're Tommy Randall, and you're Putty Henderson, so you might as
well take off them masks.'--'Which I am glad to do,' says I, 'for I
hate 'em,' and I put mine in my pocket, and Putty he took off his."
"Excuse me," said Aunt Martha, interrupting at this point, "but when
Mr. Hammond mentioned the name of Tommy Randall, to whom did he
refer?"
"I can explain that, madam," said the tall burglar, quickly. "This
man by his criminal course of life has got himself into a good many
scrapes, and is frequently obliged to change his name. Since I
accidentally became acquainted with him he has had several aliases,
and I think that he very often forgets that his real name is James
Barlow."
"That's so," said the stout man, "there never was a more correct
person than this industrious and unfortunate man sittin' by me. I am
dreadful forgetful, and sometimes I disremember what belongs to me
and what don't. Names the same as other things.
"'Well, now, Jerry,' says I, 'you needn't think you're goin' to make
anythin' by knowin' us. You've got to fork over your cash all the
same, and if you think to make anything by peachin' on us after we've
cleared out and left you peaceful in your bed, you're mistook so far
as I'm concerned; for I've made the track clear to get out of this
town before daybreak, and I don't know when I'll come back. This
place is gettin' a little too hot for me, and you're my concludin'
exercise.' Jerry he sat still for a minute, considerin'. He wasn't
no fool, and he knowed that there wasn't no use gettin' scared, nor
cussin', nor hollerin'. What's more, he knowed that we was there to
get his money, and if he didn't fork it over he'd get himself laid
out, and that was worse than losin' money any day. 'Now, boys, says
he, 'I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll make you an offer; a fair and
square offer. What money I've got I'll divide even with you, each of
us takin' a third, and I'll try to make up what I lose out of my next
contract. Now nothin' could be no squarer than that.'--'How much
money have you got, Jerry?' says I, 'that's the first thing to
know.'--'I've got thirty-one hundred dollars even,' says he, 'and
that will be one thousand and thirty-three dollars and thirty-three
cents apiece. I've got bills to pay to-morrow for lumber and bricks,
and my third will pay 'em. If I don't I'll go to pieces. You don't
want to see me break up business, do you?'--'Now, Jerry,' says I,
'that won't do. You haven't got enough to divide into three parts.
Putty and me agree to go halves with what we get out of you, and when
I lay out a piece of business I don't make no changes. Half of that
money is for me, and half is for Putty. So just hand it out, and
don't let's have no more jabberin'.'
"Jerry he looked at me pretty hard, and then says he: 'You're about
the close-fisted and meanest man I ever met with. Here I offer you a
third part of my money, and all you've got to do is to take it and go
away peaceable. I'd be willin' to bet two to one that it's more than
you expected to get, and yet you are not satisfied; now, I'll be
hanged if I'm going to do business with you.'--'You can be hanged if
you like,' says I, 'but you'll do the business all the same,'--'No, I
won't,' says he, and he turns to Putty Henderson. 'Now, Putty,' says
he, 'you've got a pile more sense than this pal of yourn, and I'm
goin' to see if I can't do business with you. Now, you and me
together can lick this Tommy Randall just as easy as not, and if
you'll help me do it I'll not only divide the money with you, but
I'll give you fifty dollars extra, so that instead of fifteen hundred
and fifty dollars--that's all he'd given you, if he didn't cheat
you--you'll have sixteen hundred, and I'll have fifteen hundred
instead of the thousand and thirty-three dollars which I would have
had left if my first offer had been took. So, Putty, what do you say
to that?' Now, Putty, he must have been a little sore with me on
account of the arguments we'd had about dividin', and he was mighty
glad besides to get the chance of makin' fifty dollars extry, and so
he said it was all right, and he'd agree. Then I thought it was
about time for me to take in some of my sail, and says I: 'Jerry,
that's a pretty good joke, and you can take my hat as soon as I get a
new one, but of course I don't mean to be hard on you, and if you
really have bills to pay to-morrow I'll take a third, and Putty'll
take another, and we'll go away peaceful.'--'No, you won't,' sings
out Jerry, and with that he jumps out of bed right at me, and Putty
Henderson he comes at me from the other side, and, between the two,
they gave me the worst lickin' I ever got in my born days, and then
they dragged me downstairs and kicked me out the front door, and I
had hardly time to pick myself up before I saw a policeman about a
block off, and if he hadn't been a fat one he'd had me sure. It
wouldn't have been pleasant, for I was a good deal wanted about that
time.
"So you see, ladies and gents, that it's true what I said--things
don't always go right in our line of business no more than any other
one."
"I think you were served exactly right," said Aunt Martha; "and I
wonder such an experience did not induce you to reform."
"It did, ma'am, it did," said the burglar. "I made a vow that night
that if ever again I had to call in any one to help me in business of
that kind I wouldn't go pards with him. I'd pay him so much for the
job, and I'd take the risks, and I've stuck to it.
"But even that don't always work. Luck sometimes goes ag'in' a man,
even when he's working by himself. I remember a thing of that kind
that was beastly hard on me. A gentleman employed me to steal his
daughter."
"What!" exclaimed my wife and Aunt Martha. "Steal his own daughter!
What do you mean by that?"
"That's what it was," said the stout burglar; "no more nor less. I
was recommended to the gent as a reliable party for that sort of
thing, and I met him to talk it over, and then he told me just how
the case stood. He and his wife were separated, and the daughter,
about eleven years old, had been given to her by the court, and she
put it into a boardin' school, and the gent he was goin' to Europe,
and he wanted to get the little gal and take her with him. He tried
to get her once, but it slipped up, and so there wasn't no good in
his showin' hisself at the school any more, which was in the country,
and he knowed that if he expected to get the gal he'd have to hire a
professional to attend to it.
"Now, when I heard what he had to say, I put on the strictly pious,
and, says I, 'that's a pretty bad thing you're askin' me to do, sir,
to carry away a little gal from its lovin' mother, and more 'an that,
to take it from a school where it's gettin' all the benefits of
eddication.'--'Eddication,' says he; 'that's all stuff. What
eddication the gal gets at a school like that isn't worth a row of
pins, and when they go away they don't know nothin' useful, nor even
anything tip-top ornamental. All they've learned is the pianer and
higher mathematics. As for anythin' useful, they're nowhere. There
isn't one of them could bound New Jersey or tell you when Washington
crossed the Delaware.'--'That may be, sir,' says I, 'but them higher
branches comes useful. If Washington really did cross the Delaware,
your little gal could ask somebody when it was, but she couldn't ask
'em how the pianer was played, nor what the whole multiplication
table came to added up. Them things she'd have to learn how to do
for herself. I give you my word, sir, I couldn't take a little gal
from a school, where she was gettin' a number one eddication, silver
forks and towels extry.' The gent looked pretty glum, for he was to
sail the next day, and if I didn't do the job for him he didn't know
who would, and he said that he was sorry to see that I was goin' back
on him after the recommend I'd had, and I said that I wouldn't go
back on him if it wasn't for my conscience. I was ready to do any
common piece of business, but this stealin' away little gals from
lovin' mothers was a leetle too much for me. 'Well,' says he, 'there
ain't no time to be lost, and how much more will satisfy your
conscience?' When I said a hundred dollars, we struck the bargain.
"Well, we cut and dried that business pretty straight. I took a cab
and went out to the school, and the gent he got the key of a house
that was to let about three miles from the school, and he was to stay
there and look at that empty house until I brought him the gal, when
he was to pay me and take her away. I'd like to have had more time,
so that I could go out and see how the land laid, but there wasn't no
more time, and I had to do the best I could. The gent told me they
all went a walkin' every afternoon, and that if I laid low that would
be the best time to get her, and I must just fetch her along, no
matter who hollered.
"I didn't know exactly how I was going to manage it, but I took along
with me a big bag that was made for the conveyance of an extinct
millionaire, but which had never been used, owin' to beforehand
arrangements which had been made with the party's family.
"I left the cab behind a bit of woods, not far from the school, and
then I laid low, and pretty soon I seed 'em all coming out, in a
double line, with the teacher behind 'em, for a walk. I had a
description of the little gal as was wanted, and as they come nearer
I made her out easy. She was the only real light-haired one in the
lot. I hid behind some bushes in the side of the road, and when they
come up, and the light-haired little gal was just opposite to me, I
jumped out of the bushes and made a dash at her. Whoop! what a row
there was in one second! Such a screamin' and screechin' of gals,
such a pilin' on top each other, and the teacher on top the whole of
'em, bangin' with her umbrella; they pulled at the gal and they
pulled at me, an' they yelled and they howled, and I never was in
such a row and hope I never shall be again, and I grabbed that girl
by her frock, and I tumbled some over one way and some another, and I
got the umbrella over my head, but I didn't mind it, and I clapped
that bag over the little gal, and I jerked up her feet and let her
slip into it, and then I took her up like a bag of meal, and put
across the field, with the whole kit and boodle after me. But I
guess most of 'em must have tumbled down in hysterics, judgin' from
the screechin', and I got up to the cab and away we went. Well, when
we got to the house where I was to meet the gent, he began straight
off to blow at me. 'What do you mean,' he yelled, 'bringin' my
daughter in a bag?'--'It's the only way to do it, sir,' says I; 'they
can't holler and they can't kick, and people passin' by don't know
what you've got,' and so sayin' I untied the strings, put the little
gal on her feet, and pulled off the bag, and then I'd be hanged if I
ever saw a man so ragin' mad as he was. 'What do I want with that
gal?' he cried; 'that's not my daughter. That girl's hair is as
black as a coal, and she's a Jew besides.' As soon as I sot my eyes
on the little varmint it come over me that I got the thing crooked,
and in the scrimmage I let go of the right gal and grabbed another.
"I don't see how a man could help makin' mistakes with that
school-teacher's umbrella whanging away at his knowledge box, but I
wasn't goin' to let on. 'She ain't no Jew, nuther,' says I, 'and
she's your daughter, too; you needn't try to play no tricks on me.
Pay me my money and take her away as quick as you can, that's my
advice, or before you know it you'll be nabbed.'--'Pay ye!' he
yelled; 'do you think I'd pay you anything for that little
Jew?'--'She's just as much a Christian as you are,' says I. 'Ain't
you a Christian, little gal? and isn't this gentleman your father?
and ain't you surprised that he wants to give you back to be put in
the bag?' I said this hopin' she'd have sense enough to say he was
her father so's to get rid of me.
"The wretched gal had been clean dumbfounded when she was took out of
the bag, and hadn't done nothin' so far but blubber and cry, and try
to get away, which she couldn't, because I held her frock; but now
she ups and screams he wasn't her father, and she'd never seen him
before, and then he storms and swears, and tells me to take her back
where I got her, and I tell him I'll see him hanged first, and what I
want is my money; she screams, and he swears he'll not pay me a cent,
and I squares off and says that I'll thrash him out of his skin, and
then he calls in his coachman, and they both make at me, and I backs
out the door to get my cabby to stand by me, and I found that he'd
cut out, havin' most likely got frightened, afraid of bein' mixed up
in trouble. Then I seed on the high road, some half a mile away,
some men comin' gallopin', and the gent he looked out and seed 'em,
too, and then says he to me, 'You'll jist take that little Jew gal
back where you got her from; she's no use to me; I'm goin';' and at
that I hollered for my money, and made a grab at him, but the
coachman he tripped me over backward, and before I could git up again
they was both off with the horses on a run.
"I was so mad I couldn't speak, but there wasn't no time for foolin',
and I hadn't made up my mind which door I should cut out of, when the
fellows on horseback went ridin' past as hard as they could go. They
must have seed the carriage drivin' away, and thought for sure it had
the gal in it, and they was after it, lickety-split.
"When they was clean gone I looked round for the little gal, but
couldn't see her, but all a-sudden she came out of the fireplace,
where she'd been hidin'. She'd got over her cryin', and over her
scare, too, judgin' from her looks. 'I'm glad he's gone,' says she,
'and I'm mighty glad, too, that Mr. Haskins and them other men didn't
see me.'--'Who's they?' says I.--'They's neighbors,' says she; 'if
they knew I was here they'd took me back.'--'Well, you little minx,'
says I, 'isn't that what you want?'--'No,' says she. 'I didn't want
to go with that man, for I don't know him, and I hate him, but I
don't want to go back to that school. I hate it worse than anything
in the whole world. You haven't no idea what a horrid place it is.
They just work you to death, and don't give you half enough to eat.
My constitution won't stand it. I've told Pop that, and he thinks so
too, but Marm, she don't believe in it, and my stayin' there is all
her doin'. I've been wantin' to get away for ever so long, but I
didn't want to be took off in a bag; but now that I'm out of that
horrid hole I don't want to go back, and if you'll take me home to
Pop, I know he won't let me go back, and he'll pay you real handsome
besides.'--'Who's your Pop?' says I.--'He's Mr. Groppeltacker, of
Groppeltacker & Mintz, corset findings, seven hundred and something
or other, I forget the number now, Broadway. Oh, Pop does a lot of
business, I tell you, and he's got lots of money. He sends corset
findings to South America, and Paris, and Chicago, and Madagascar,
and the uttermost parts of the earth. I've heard him say that often,
and you needn't be afraid of his not bein' able to pay you. A lot
more than that man would have paid you for his little gal, if you'd
catched the right one. So if you take me to Pop, and get me there
safe and sound, it will be an awful good speck for you.'
"Now, I begins to think to myself that perhaps there was somethin' in
what that little Jew gal was sayin', and that I might make something
out of the gal after all. I didn't count on gettin' a big pile out
of old Groppeltacker--it wasn't likely he was that kind of a man--but
whatever I did get would be clean profit, and I might as well try it
on. He couldn't make no charge ag'in me fur bringin' him his
daughter, if she asked me to do it; so says I to her, 'Now, if I take
you home to your Pop, will you promise on your word an' honor, that
you won't say nothin' about my carryin' you off in a bag, and say
that you seed me walkin' along the road and liked my looks, and told
me you were sufferin', and asked me to take you home to your kind
parents, where you might be took proper care of; and that I said I
wasn't goin' that way, but I'd do it out of pure Christian charity,
and nothin' more or less, and here you was? And then, of course, you
can tell him he ought to do the handsome thing by me.'--'I'll do
that,' says she, 'and I tell how you talked to me awful kind for more
than an hour, tryin' to keep me to stay at the school, and it wasn't
till I got down on my knees and weeped that you agreed to take me to
my kind father.'--'All right,' says I, 'I might as well take you
along, but we'll have to go back by the railroad and foot it, at
least two miles, to the station, and I don't know about walkin'
across the country with a little girl dressed as fine as you are. I
might get myself suspicioned.'--'That's so,' says she; 'we might meet
somebody that'd know me,' and then she wriggled up her little
forehead and began to think. I never did see such a little gal as
sharp as that one was; needles was nothin' to her. In about a minute
she says, 'Where's that bag of yourn?--'Here it is,' says I; and then
she took it and looked at it up and down, with her head cocked on one
side. 'If I'd somethin' to cut that bag with,' says she, 'I could
fix myself up so that nobody'd know me, don't care who it was.'--'I
don't want that bag cut,' says I; 'it's an extry good bag; it was
made for a particular purpose, and cost money.'--'Pop will pay
expenses,' says she; 'how much did it cost?'--'It was four dollars
cash,' said I.--'They cheated you like everything,' says she; 'you
could get a bag like that any day for a dollar and seventy-five
cents. Will you let it go at that?'--'All right,' says I, for I was
tickled to see how sharp that little Jew gal was, and ten to one I'd
throwed away the bag before we got to town; so she pulled a little
book out of her pocket with a pencil stuck in it, and turnin' over to
a blank page she put down, 'Bag, one dollar and seventy-five;' then
she borrows my big knife, and holdin' the top of the bag up ag'in her
belt, she made me stick a pin in it about a hand's-breadth from the
floor; then she took the knife and cut the bag clean across, me
a-holdin' one side of it; then she took the top end of that bag and
slipped it on her, over her head and shoulders, and tied the drawin'
strings in it round her waist, and it hung around her just like a
skirt, nearly touchin' the ground; then she split open the rest of
the bag, and made a kind of shawl out of it, puttin' it into shape
with a lot o' pins, and pinnin' it on herself real clever. She had
lots of pins in her belt, and she told me that she never passed a pin
in that school without pickin' it up, and that she had four hundred
and fifty-nine of them now in her room, which she was mighty sorry to
leave behind, and that these she had now was this day's pickin' up.
"When she got done workin' at herself you couldn't see not a ribbon
nor a hem of her fine clothes; it was all black skirt and shawl, and
she'd put up her sleeve, so that when her arm stuck out it was bare.
Then she took all the ribbons and flowers off her hat, and crumpled
it up, and when she tied it on what a guy she was. 'Now,' says she,
'I can go barefoot.'--'Which you won't,' says I, 'for you'll get your
feet all cut, but you can muddy your shoes,' which she did, I pumpin'
on 'em, so that the dust in the back yard would stick. Then we
starts off across the country, and, upon my word, I was pretty nigh
ashamed to be seen walkin' with such a little scarecrow. When I
bought the tickets at the station she asked me how much they was, and
put it down in her book. When we got into the cars the people all
looked hard at her, and I reckon they thought some kind of a home had
been burnt down, and this was one of the orphans that had been saved.
But they didn't say nothin', and she fixed herself as comfortable as
you please; and before long a boy came through the car with fruit in
a basket, and then says she to me, 'I want two apples.' The boy had
gone past us, but I got up and followed him and bought her two
apples. 'How much did you give for them?' says she, when I come
back.--'They was two for five cents,' says I.--'Well,' says she,
'they do stick you dreadful. Two for three cents is all papa or I
pays for apples like them,' and she took out her little book and put
down, 'Apples, three cents.'--'Very well, miss,' says I, 'but if you
want any more refreshments you buy 'em yourself.'--'I think I'd
better,' says she, and she went to work eatin' them two apples. She
hadn't more than got through with 'em when the boy came around ag'in.
'I want a banana,' says she; 'lend me five cents,' which I did, and
she put down, 'Cash, five cents.' Then the boy come up, and says
she, 'How much are your bananas?'--'Five cents,' said he.--'For two?'
says she.--'No,' says he, 'for one,'--'What do you take me for?' says
she. 'I've bought bananas before. I'll give you three cents for
that one,' pointin' to the biggest in the lot.--'I can't do that,'
said the boy, 'the price is five cents.'--'I'd like a banana,' says
she, 'but I don't pay more'n three cents; take it or leave it,' and
with that the boy went on. 'Now,' says I, 'you've gouged yourself
out of a banana.'--'Not a bit of it,' says she; 'he'll be back,' and
in two minutes he was back, and said she might have it for three
cents. 'Have you got two coppers?' said she. 'Let me see 'em.' He
said he had, and showed 'em to her, and she took 'em and the banana,
and then give him five cents, and then she didn't give the change to
me, but put it in her pocket. 'Now,' says she, 'if you'd buy things
that way, you'd be rich in time.'
"When we got to the city we took the elevated and went up town to
Forty-eighth street, and then walked over to her father's house. It
was a big one, on one of the cross streets. When we got there, she
told me to wait a minute, and, lookin' around to see that nobody was
comin', she slipped off the skirt and the cape she had made and
rolled 'em up in a bundle. 'It don't matter about my hat and shoes,'
says she, 'but they wouldn't know me in such duds.' Then, handin' me
the bundle, she said, 'For twenty-five cents you can get that bag
mended just as good as new, so you can take it, and it will save us a
dollar and a half.'--'No, you don't,' says I, for I'd had enough of
her stinginess. I don't touch that bag ag'in, and I made up my mind
that minute to charge the old man five dollars' worth. When the
front door was opened, the servant gal looked as if she couldn't
believe her eyes, but my young woman was as cool as you please, and
she had me showed into a room off the hall, and then she went
upstairs.
"I sat a-waitin' a long time, which gave me a good chance to look
around at things. The room was real handsome, and I took a peep at
the window fastenin's and the lay of the doors, thinkin' the
knowledge might come in handy some time. Right in front of me on a
table was a little yellow mouse, and it struck me as I looked at it
that that must be gold. I listened if anybody was comin', and then I
picked it up to see if it really was. I thought I heard the
door-bell ring just then, and shut it up in my hand quick, but
nobody; went to the door; and then I looked at the little mouse, and
if it wasn't pure gold it was the best imitation ever I see, so I
slipped it quietly in my pocket to look at it ag'in when I had time.
"Pretty soon old Groppeltacker come in, shut the door, and sot down.
'So you brought my daughter back,' says he.--'Yes,' says I.--'And you
expect to be paid for it,' says he.--'Yes,' says I, 'I do.'--'How
much do you ask for your services?' says he. Now, this was a sort of
a staggerer, for I hadn't made up my mind how much I was goin' to
ask; but there wasn't time for no more thinkin' about it, and so says
I, plum, 'A hundred dollars, and there was some expenses
besides.'--'Well, well,' says he, 'that seems like a good deal, just
for bringin' a little gal from school. It couldn't have took you
more'n a couple of hours.'--'I don't charge for time,' says I, 'it's
for the risks and the science of the thing. There's mighty few men
in this town could have brought your daughter home as neat as I
did.'--'Well, well,' says he, rubbin' his hands, 'I expect I'll have
to pay for the whole term of the school, whether she's there or not,
and the business will come heavy on me. Don't you think sixty
dollars would pay you?' Now, I know when you deal with this sort of a
man there's always a good deal of difference splittin'; and so, says
I, 'No, it won't. I might take ninety dollars, but that's the very
lowest peg.'--'The very lowest?' says he, gettin' up and walkin'
about a little; and then I thought I heard the doorbell ring again,
and I was dreadful afraid somebody would come and call off the old
man before he finished the bargain. 'Well,' says I, 'we'll call it
eighty-five and expenses, and there I'll stop.'
"Groppeltacker, now he sot down ag'in and looked hard at me. 'I
didn't ask you to bring my daughter back,' says he, speakin' gruff,
and very different from the way he spoke before, 'and what's more, I
didn't want her back, and what's more yet, I'm not goin' to pay you a
red cent.'--'Now, look a-here,' says I, mighty sharp, 'none o' that,
old man; fork over the money or I'll lay you out stiff as a poker,
and help myself. I'm not a fellow to be fooled with, and there's
nobody in this house can stop me.' Old Groppeltacker, he didn't turn
a hair, but just sot there, and says he, 'Before you blow any more,
suppose you take my little gold mouse out of your pocket and hand it
to me.' I must say I was took back at this, but I spoke back, as
bold as brass, and said I never seed his gold mouse. 'O, ho!' says
he, 'what you didn't see was the electric button under the table
cover which rung a bell when the mouse was picked up. That's what I
call my mouse-trap.'
"At this I jist b'iled over. 'Now,' says I, 'just you hand out every
cent you've got, and your watch, too; not another word.' And I
jumped up and clapped my hand on my pistol in my hip-pocket, and just
at that minute there was a click and the nippers were on me, and
there was a big policeman with his hand on my shoulder. I couldn't
speak, I was so b'ilin' and so dumbfounded both at once. Old
Groppeltacker he just leaned back and he laughed. 'You came in,' he
said to the cop, 'jest the second I rang, and as soft as a cat, and
the first thing that I want you to do is to take that gold mouse out
of his pocket, and I'll be on hand whenever you let me know I'm
wanted.' The cop he took the gold mouse out of my pocket, and says
he, 'I know this fellow, and if I'm not mistook, they'll be more
charges than yourn made ag'in him.' There wasn't no chance to show
fight, so I didn't do it, but I says to old Groppeltacker, 'There's
my expenses, you've got to pay them, anyway.'--'All right,' says he,
'jist you send in your bill, marked correct by my daughter, and I'll
settle it,' and he laughed again, and the cop he took me off. Well,
ladies and gents, that little piece of business, together with some
other old scores, took me to Sing Sing for three years, and it tain't
six months since I got out, so you can see for yourselves what hard
times a fellow in my line of business sometimes has."
"Well," said Aunt Martha, "I don't approve of the Groppeltacker sort
of people, but if there were more of that kind I believe there would
be fewer of your kind. That story shows you in such a bad light that
I believe it's true."
"Every word of it," said the man. "I wish it wasn't."
And now I spoke. "Since you claim to be a truth-telling being," I
said to the stout burglar, "suppose you tell me why you never
attempted before to break into my house. Every considerable dwelling
in this neighborhood has been entered, and I have no doubt you are
the men who committed all the burglaries."
"No, sir," said he; "not men, I am the man who did 'em all; but these
two friends of mine was never with me before in a bit of business
like this. 'Tain't in their line. I have had pals with me, but they
was professionals. These ain't cracksmen, they don't know nothin'
about it; but this one is handy at tools, and that's the reason I
brung him along, but you see he kicked, and was goin' to give me
away, and this young gentleman"--
"Never mind about that young gentleman," I said; "I have a certain
curiosity to know why my house was not entered when the others were."
"Well," said he, "I don't mind tellin' yer how that was. It was on
account of your baby. We don't like to crack a house where there's a
pretty small baby that's liable to wake up and howl any minute, and
rouse up the rest of the family. There's no workin' in a house with
comfort when there's such a young one about. I'll tell you what it
is, all your burglar-alarms and your dogs ain't worth nuthin'
alongside of a baby for guardin' a house. If a cracksman ain't
careful the alarms will go off, and if he don't know how to manage
dogs, the dogs will bark. But by George, sir, there ain't no
providin' ag'in a baby. He'll howl any time, and nobody can tell
when, so I waited till your baby was a little more settled in its
ways and slept soundly, and then we come along, and here we are."
This statement very much surprised me, and did not elate me. Without
saying so to any one, I had flattered myself that the burglars had
heard of my precautions, and of my excellent stock of firearms, and
perhaps had got a notion that I would be an intrepid man to deal
with, and it was somewhat humiliating to find that it was our baby
the burglars were afraid of, and not myself. My wife was amazed.
"Can it be possible," she said, "that these people know so much about
our baby, and that George William has been protecting this house?"
"It makes my flesh creep," said Aunt Martha. "Do you know everything
about all of us?"
"Wish I did, ma'am," said the stout burglar; "wish I'd known about
that beastly liquor."
"Well, we've had enough of this," said I, rising; "and, my dear, you
and Aunt Martha must be ready to go to bed, and David and I will keep
guard over these fellows until morning."
At this instant the youngest burglar spoke. His face wore a very
anxious expression.
"May I ask, sir," he said, "what you intend to do with me in the
morning?"
"I have already said," I answered, "that I shall then hand over all
of you to the officers of justice of this country."
"But, sir," said the young man, "you will surely except me. I am not
at all concerned in this matter, and it would be of the greatest
possible injury to me to be mixed up in it, or to be mentioned in
public reports as an associate of a criminal. I'm not acquainted
with the gentleman at the other end of the bench, but I have every
reason to believe from what he said to me that he intended to notify
you if this James Barlow proceeded to any open act. For myself, I
beg you will allow me to state who and what I am, and to tell you by
what a strange concatenation of circumstances I happen to find myself
in my present position--one which, I assure you, causes me the
greatest embarrassment and anxiety."
"We've had enough story-telling for one night," said I, "and you had
better reserve your statement for the magistrate."
Here Aunt Martha put in her voice.
"That is not fair," she said, "two of them have been allowed to
speak, and this one has just as much right to be heard as the others.
What do you say, Cornelia?"
I hoped that my wife would put herself on my side, and would say that
we had enough of this sort of thing; but female curiosity is an
unknown quantity, and she unhesitatingly replied that she would like
to hear the young man's story. I sat down in despair. It was
useless to endeavor to withstand this yearning for personal
information--one of the curses, I may say, of our present
civilization. The young man gave no time for change of opinion, but
immediately began. His voice was rich and rather low, and his manner
exceedingly pleasing and gentle.
"I wish to state in the first place," said he, "that I am a reporter
for the press. In the exercise of my vocation I have frequently
found myself in peculiar and unpleasant positions, but never before
have I been in a situation so embarrassing, so humiliating, as this.
In the course of my studies and experiences I have found that in
literature and journalism, as well as in art, one can make a true
picture only of what one has seen. Imagination is all very well,
often grand and beautiful; but imaginative authors show us their
inner selves and not our outer world; there is to-day a demand for
the real, and it is a demand which will be satisfied with nothing but
the truth. I have determined, as far as in me lies, to endeavor to
supply this demand, and I have devoted myself to the study of Realism.
"With this end in view, I have made it a rule never to describe
anything I have not personally seen and examined. If we would
thoroughly understand and appreciate our fellow-beings we must know
what they do and how they do it; otherwise we cannot give them credit
for their virtues, or judge them properly for their faults. If I
could prevent crime I would annihilate it, and when it ceased to
exist the necessity for describing it would also cease. But it does
exist. It is a powerful element in the life of the human race.
Being known and acknowledged everywhere, it should be understood;
therefore it should be described. The grand reality of which we are
a part can never be truly comprehended until we comprehend all its
parts. But I will not philosophize. I have devoted myself to
Realism, and in order to be a conscientious student I study it in all
its branches. I am frequently called upon to write accounts of
burglars and burglaries, and in order thoroughly to understand these
people and their method of action I determined, as soon as the
opportunity should offer itself, to accompany a burglarious
expedition. My sole object was the acquisition of knowledge of the
subject--knowledge which to me would be valuable, and, I may say,
essential. I engaged this man, James Barlow, to take me with him the
first time he should have on hand an affair of this kind, and thus it
is that you find me here to-night in this company. As I came here
for the purpose of earnest and thorough investigation, I will frankly
admit that I would not have interfered with his processes, but at the
same time I would have seen that no material injuries should result
to any members of this family."
"That was very kind of you," I said, at which my wife looked at me
somewhat reproachingly.
"If he really intended it," she remarked, "and I do not see why that
was not the case, it was kind in him."
"As for me," said Aunt Martha, very sympathetically, "I think that
the study of Realism may be carried a great deal too far. I do not
think that there is the slightest necessity for people to know
anything about burglars. If people keep talking and reading about
diseases they will get them, and if they keep talking and reading
about crimes they will find that iniquity is catching, the same as
some other things. Besides, this realistic description gets to be
very tiresome. If you really want to be a writer, young man, why
don't you try your hand on some original composition? Then you might
write something which would be interesting."
"Ah, madam," said the young man, casting his eyes on the floor, "it
would be far beyond my power to write anything more wonderful than
what I have known and seen! If I may tell you some of the things
which have happened to me, you will understand why I have become
convinced that in this world of realities imagination must always
take a second place."
"Of course we want to hear your story," said Aunt Martha; "that is
what we are here for."
"If I was unbound," said the young man, looking at me, "I could speak
more freely."
"No doubt of it," said I; "but perhaps you might run away before you
finished your story. I wouldn't have that happen for the world."
"Don't make fun of him," said Aunt Martha. "I was going to ask you
to cut him loose, but after what you say I think it would perhaps be
just as well to keep them all tied until the narratives are
completed."
With a sigh of resignation the young man began his story.
"I am American born, but my father, who was a civil engineer and of
high rank in his profession, was obliged, when I was quite a small
boy, to go to Austria, where he had made extensive contracts for the
building of railroads. In that country I spent the greater part of
my boyhood and youth. There I was educated in the best schools, my
father sparing no money to have me taught everything that a gentleman
should know. My mother died when I was a mere infant, and as my
father's vocation made it necessary for him to travel a great deal,
my life was often a lonely one. For society I depended entirely upon
my fellow-scholars, my tutors, and masters. It was my father's
intention, however, that when I had finished my studies I should go
to one of the great capitals, there to mix with the world.
"But when this period arrived I was in no haste to avail myself of
the advantages he offered me. My tastes were studious, my
disposition contemplative, and I was a lover of rural life.
"My father had leased an old castle in Carinthia, not far from the
mountains, and here he kept his books and charts, and here he came
for recreation and study whenever his arduous duties gave him a
little breathing-spell. For several months I had lived at this
castle, happy when my father was with me and happy when I was alone.
I expected soon to go to Vienna, where my father would introduce me
to some of his influential friends. But day by day I postponed the
journey.
"Walking one morning a few miles from the castle, I saw at the edge
of a piece of woodland a female figure seated beneath a tree.
Approaching nearer, I perceived that she was young, and that she was
sketching. I was surprised, for I knew that in this part of the
world young women, at least those of the upper classes, to which the
costume and tastes of this one showed her to belong, were not allowed
to wander about the country by themselves; but although I stood still
and watched the young lady for some time, no companion appeared upon
the scene.
"The path I had intended to take led past the piece of woodland, and
I saw no reason why I should diverge from my proposed course. I
accordingly proceeded, and when I reached the young lady I bowed and
raised my hat. I think that for some time she had perceived my
approach, and she looked up at me with a face that was half merry,
half inquisitive, and perfectly charming. I cannot describe the
effect which her expression had upon me. I had never seen her
before, but her look was not such a one as she would bestow upon a
stranger. I had the most powerful desire to stop and speak to her,
but having no right to do so, I should have passed on, had she not
said to me, in the best of English, 'Good-morning, sir.' Then I
stopped, you may be sure. I was so accustomed to speak to those I
meet in either French or German that I involuntarily said to her,
'_Bon jour, Mademoiselle._'--'You need not speak French,' she said;
'I am neither English nor American, but I speak English. Are you the
gentleman who lives in Wulrick Castle? If so, we are neighbors, and
I wish you would tell me why you live there all the time alone.'
"At this I sat down by her. 'I am that person,' I said, and handed
her my card. 'But before I say any more, please tell me who you
are.'--'I am Marie Dorfler. My father's house is on the other side
of this piece of woodland; you cannot see it from here; this is part
of his estate. And now tell me why you live all by yourself in that
old ruin.'--'It is not altogether a ruin,' I answered; 'part of it is
in very good condition.' And then I proceeded to give her an account
of my method of life and my reasons for it. 'It is interesting,' she
said, 'but it is very odd.'--'I do not think it half so odd,' I
answered, 'as that you should be here by yourself.'--'That is truly
an out-of-the-way sort of thing,' she said; 'but just now I am doing
out-of-the-way things. If I do not do them now, I shall never have
the opportunity again. In two weeks I shall be married, and then I
shall go to Prague, and everything will be by line and rule. No more
delightful rambles by myself. No more sitting quietly in the woods
watching the little birds and hares. No more making a sketch just
where I please, no matter whether the ground be damp or not.'--'I
wonder that you are allowed to do these things now,' I said.--'I am
not allowed,' she answered. 'I do them in hours when I am supposed
to be painting flower pieces in an upper room.'--'But when you're
married,' I said, 'your husband will be your companion in such
rambles.'--'Hardly,' she said, shrugging her shoulders; 'he will be
forty-seven on the thirteenth of next month, which I believe is July,
and he is a great deal more grizzled than my father, who is past
fifty. He is very particular about all sorts of things, as I suppose
he has to be, as he is a Colonel of infantry. Nobody could possibly
disapprove of my present performances more than he would.' I could
not help ejaculating, 'Why, then, do you marry him?' She smiled at
my earnestness. 'Oh, that is all arranged,' she said, 'and I have
nothing to do with it. I have known for more than a year that I'm to
marry Colonel Kaldhein, but I cannot say that I have given myself
much concern about it until recently. It now occurs to me that if I
expect to amuse myself in the way I best like I must lose no time
doing so.' I looked at the girl with earnest interest. 'It appears
to me,' said I, 'that your ways of amusing yourself are very much
like mine.'--'That is true,' she said, looking up with animation,
'they are. Is it not delightful to be free, to go where you like,
and do what you please, without any one to advise or interfere with
you?'--'It is delightful,' said I; and for half an hour we sat and
talked about these delights and kindred subjects. She was much
interested in our castle, and urged me to make a sketch of it, so
that she may know what it now looked like. She had seen it when a
little girl, but never since, and had been afraid to wander very far
in this direction by herself. I told her that it would be far better
for her to see the castle with her own eyes, and that I could conduct
her to an eminence, not half a mile away, where she could have an
excellent view of it. This plan greatly pleased her; but looking at
her watch she said that it would be too late for her to go that
morning, but if I happened to come that way the next day, and she
should be there to finish her sketch, she would be delighted to have
me show her the eminence."
"I think," interrupted Aunt Martha, "that she was a very imprudent
young woman."
"That may be," he replied, "but you must remember, madam, that up to
this time the young lady had been subjected to the most conventional
trammels, and that her young nature had just burst out into temporary
freedom and true life. It was the caged bird's flight into the
bright summer air."
"Just the kind of birds," said Aunt Martha, "that shouldn't be
allowed to fly, at least until they are used to it. But you can go
on with your story."
"Well," said the young man, "the next day we met I took her to the
piece of high ground I had mentioned, and she sketched the castle.
After that we met again and again, nearly every day. This sort of
story tells itself. I became madly in love with her, and I am sure
she liked me very well; at all events I was a companion of her own
age and tastes, and such a one, she assured me, she had never known
before, and probably would never know again."
"There was some excuse for her," said Aunt Martha; "but still she had
no right to act in that way, especially as she was so soon to be
married."
"I do not think that she reasoned much upon the subject," said the
young man, "and I am sure I did not. We made no plans. Every day we
thought only of what we were doing or saying, and not at all what we
had done or would do. We were very happy.
"One morning I was sitting by Marie in the very place where I had
first met her, when we heard some one rapidly approaching. Looking
up I saw a tall man in military uniform. 'Heavens!' cried Marie, 'it
is Colonel Kaldhein.'
"The situation was one of which an expectant bridegroom would not be
likely to ask many questions. Marie was seated on a low stone with
her drawing-block in her lap. She was finishing the sketch on which
she was engaged when I first saw her, and I was kneeling close to
her, looking over her work and making various suggestions, and I
think my countenance must have indicated that I found it very
pleasant to make suggestions in that way to such a pretty girl. Our
heads were very close together. Sometimes we looked at the paper,
sometimes we looked at each other. But in the instant I caught sight
of the Colonel the situation had changed. I rose to my feet, and
Marie began to pick up the drawing materials, which were lying about
her.
"Colonel Kaldhein came forward almost at a run. His eyes blazed
through his gold spectacles, and his close-cut reddish beard seemed
to be singeing with the fires of rage. I had but an instant for
observation, for he came directly up to me, and with a tremendous
objurgation he struck me full in the face with such force that the
blow stretched me upon the ground.
"I was almost stunned; but I heard a scream from Marie, a storm of
angry words from Kaldhein, and I felt sure he was about to inflict
further injury. He was a much stronger man than I was, and probably
was armed. With a sudden instinct of self-preservation I rolled down
a little declivity on the edge of which I had fallen, and staggering
to my feet, plunged into a thicket and fled. Even had I been in the
full possession of my senses, I knew that under the circumstances I
would have been of no benefit to Marie had I remained upon the scene.
The last thing I heard was a shout from Kaldhein, in which he
declared that he would kill me yet. For some days I did not go out
of my castle. My face was bruised, my soul was dejected. I knew
there was no possible chance that I should meet Marie, and that there
was a chance that I might meet the angry Colonel. An altercation at
this time would be very annoying and painful to the lady, no matter
what the result, and I considered it my duty to do everything that
was possible to avoid a meeting with Kaldhein. Therefore, as I have
said, I shut myself up within the walls of old Wulrick, and gave
strict orders to my servants to admit no one.
"It was at this time that the strangest events of my life occurred.
Sitting in an upper room, gazing out of the window, over the fields,
through which I had walked so happily but two days before to meet the
lady whom I had begun to think of as my Marie, I felt the head of a
dog laid gently in my lap. Without turning my head I caressed the
animal, and stroked the long hair on his neck.
"My hound Ajax was a dear companion to me in this old castle,
although I never took him in my walks, as he was apt to get into
mischief, and when I turned my head to look at him he was gone; but
strange to say, the hand which had been stroking the dog felt as if
it were still resting on his neck.
"Quickly drawing my hand toward me it struck the head of the dog,
and, moving it backward and forward, I felt the ears and nose of the
animal, and then became conscious that its head was still resting
upon my knee.
"I started back. Had I been stricken with blindness? But no;
turning my head, I could plainly see everything in the room. The
scene from the window was as distinct as it ever had been. I sprang
to my feet, and, as I stood wondering what this strange thing could
mean, the dog brushed up against me and licked my hand. Then the
idea suddenly flashed into my mind that by some occult influence Ajax
had been rendered invisible.
"I dashed downstairs, and although I could neither see nor hear it, I
felt that the dog was following me. Rushing into the open air, I saw
one of my men. 'Where's Ajax?' I cried. 'A very strange thing has
happened, sir,' he said, 'and I should have come to tell you of it,
had I not been unwilling to disturb your studies. About two hours
ago Ajax was lying here in the courtyard; suddenly he sprang to his
feet with a savage growl. His hair stood straight upon his back, his
tail was stiff, and his lips were drawn back, showing his great
teeth. I turned to see what had enraged him, but there was
absolutely nothing, sir--nothing in the world. And never did I see
Ajax so angry. But this lasted only for an instant. Ajax suddenly
backed, his tail dropped between his legs, his head hung down, and
with a dreadful howl he turned, and, leaping the wall of the
courtyard, he disappeared. I have since been watching for his
return. The gate is open, and as soon as he enters I shall chain
him, for I fear the dog is mad.'
"I did not dare to utter the thoughts that were in my mind, but,
bidding the man inform me the moment Ajax returned, I re-entered the
castle and sat down in the great hall.
"The dog was beside me; his head again lay upon my knees. With a
feeling of awe, yet strangely enough without fear, I carefully passed
my hand over the animal's head. I felt his ears, his nose, his jaws,
and his neck. They were not the head, the ears, the nose, the jaws,
or the neck of Ajax!
"I had heard of animals, and even human beings, who were totally
invisible, but who still retained their form, their palpability, and
all the powers and functions of life. I had heard of houses haunted
by invisible animals; I had read De Kay's story of the maiden
Manmat'ha, whose coming her lover perceived by the parting of the
tall grain in the field of ripe wheat through which she passed, but
whose form, although it might be folded in his arms, was yet as
invisible to his sight as the summer air. I did not doubt for a
moment that the animal that had come to me was one of those strange
beings. I lifted his head; it was heavy. I took hold of a paw which
he readily gave me; he had every attribute of a real dog, except that
he could not be seen."
"I call that perfectly horrible," said Aunt Martha with a sort of a
gasp.
"Perhaps," said the young man, "you would prefer that I should not
continue."
At this both my wife and Aunt Martha declared that he must go on, and
even I did not object to hearing the rest of the story.
"Well," said the young man, "Ajax never came back. It is generally
believed that dogs can see things which are invisible to us, and I am
afraid that my faithful hound was frightened, perhaps to death, when
he found that the animal whose entrance into the courtyard he had
perceived was a supernatural thing.
"But if I needed a canine companion I had one, for by day or night
this invisible dog never left me. When I slept he lay on the floor
by the side of my bed; if I put down my hand I could always feel his
head, and often he would stand up and press his nose against me, as
if to assure me that he was there. This strange companionship
continued for several days, and I became really attached to the
invisible animal. His constant companionship seemed to indicate that
he had come to guard me, and that he was determined to do it
thoroughly. I felt so much confidence in his protection, although I
knew not how it could be exerted, that one morning I decided to take
a walk, and with my hand on the head of the dog, to make sure that he
was with me, I strolled into the open country.
"I had walked about a mile, and was approaching a group of large
trees, when suddenly from behind one of them the tall figure of a man
appeared. In an instant I knew it to be Colonel Kaldhein; his was a
face which could not easily be forgotten. Without a word he raised a
pistol which he held in his hand and fired at me. The ball whistled
over my head.
"I stopped short, startled, and frightened almost out of my senses.
I was unarmed, and had no place of refuge. It was plain that the man
was determined to kill me.
"Quickly recocking his pistol, Kaldhein raised it again. I
involuntarily shrank back, expecting death; but before he could fire
his arm suddenly dropped, and the pistol was discharged into the
ground. Then began a strange scene. The man shouted, kicked, and
beat up and down with his arms; his pistol fell from his hand, he
sprang from side to side, he turned around, he struggled and yelled.
"I stood astounded. For an instant I supposed the man had been
overtaken by some sort of fit; but in a flash the truth came to
me--Kaldhein was being attacked by my protector, the invisible dog.
"Horrified by this conviction, my first impulse was to save the man;
and, without knowing what I was going to do, I stepped quickly toward
him, but stumbling over something I did not see I fell sprawling.
Before I could regain my feet I saw Kaldhein fall backward to the
ground, where a scene took place, so terrible that I shall not
attempt to describe it. When, with trembling steps, I approached,
the man was dead. The invisible dog had almost torn him to pieces.
"I could do nothing. I did not remain upon the spot another minute,
but hurried home to the castle. As I rapidly walked on I felt the
dog beside me, and, putting my hand upon him, I felt that he was
panting terribly. For three days I did not leave the house.
"About the end of this time I was sitting in an upper room of the
castle, reflecting upon the recent dreadful event, when the thought
struck me that the invisible dog, who was by my side, apparently
asleep, must be of an unusually powerful build to overcome so easily
such a strong man as Kaldhein. I felt a desire to know how large the
creature really was, and, as I had never touched any portion of his
body back of his shoulders, I now passed my hand along his back. I
was amazed at his length, and when I had moved my hand at least seven
feet from his head it still rested upon his body. And then the form
of that body began to change in a manner which terrified me; but
impelled by a horrible but irresistible curiosity, my hand moved on.
"But I no longer touched the body of a dog; the form beneath my hand
was cylindrical, apparently about a foot in diameter. As my hand
moved on the diameter diminished, and the skin of the creature became
cold and clammy. I was feeling the body of a snake!
"I now had reached the open door of the room. The body of the snake
extended through it. It went on to the top of the stairs; these I
began to descend, my heart beating fast with terror, my face
blanched, I am sure, but my hand still moving along the body of the
awful creature. I had studied zoology, giving a good deal of
attention to reptiles, and I knew that, judged by the ordinary ratio
of diminution of the bodies of serpents, this one must extend a long
distance down the stairs.
"But I had not descended more than a dozen steps before I felt a
shiver beneath my hand, and then a jerk, and the next moment the
snake's body was violently drawn upward. I withdrew my hand and
started to one side, and then, how, I know not, I became aware that
the dog part of the creature was coming downstairs.
"I now became possessed by a wild terror. The creature must be
furious that I had discovered his real form. He had always been
careful to keep his head toward me. I should be torn to pieces as
Kaldhein had been! Down the stairs I dashed, across the courtyard,
and toward a lofty old tower, which stood in one corner of the
castle. I ran up the winding stairs of this with a speed which
belongs only to a frantically terrified creature, until I reached the
fourth story, where I dashed through an open doorway, slammed behind
me an iron door, which shut with a spring, and fell gasping upon the
floor.
"In less than a minute I was aware, by a slight rattling of the
grate-hinges, that something was pushing against the door; but I did
not move. I knew that I was safe. The room in which I lay was a
prison dungeon, and in it, in the olden times, it is said, men had
been left to perish. Escape or communication with the outer world
was impossible. A little light and air came through a narrow slit in
the wall, and the door could not be forced.
"I knew that the invisible dog, or whatever it was, could not get in
unless the door was open. I had frequently noticed that when he
entered a room it was through an open door, and I sometimes knew of
his approach by seeing an unlatched door open without visible cause;
so, feeling secure for the present, I lay and gasped and panted.
"After the lapse of a few hours, however, I was seized by a new
terror. How was I ever to get out of this horrible dungeon? Even if
I made up my mind to face the dog, trusting that he had recovered
from his momentary anger, I had no means of opening the door, and as
to making any one hear me I knew that was impossible.
"I had no hope that my servants would seek me here. I had not seen
any one when I ran into the tower, and if they should discover that I
was in this dungeon, how could they open the door? The key was in my
father's possession. He had taken it to Vienna to exhibit it as a
curiosity to some of his mechanical friends. He believed that there
was not such another key in the world. I was in the habit of making
long absences from the castle, and if I should be looked for I
believed that the tower would be the last place visited.
"Night came on; the little light in the room vanished, and, hungry,
thirsty, and almost hopeless, I fell asleep.
"During the night there was a most dreadful storm. The thunder
roared, the lightning flashed through the slit in the wall, and the
wind blew with such terrific violence that the tower shook and
trembled. After a time I heard a tremendous crash as of falling
walls, and then another, and now I felt the wind blowing into my
prison.
"There was no further sleep for me. Trembling with a fearful
apprehension of what might happen next, I cowered against the wall
until the day broke, and then I perceived that in front of me was a
great hole in the wall of the dungeon, which extended for more than a
yard above the floor. I sat and gazed at this until the light became
stronger, and then I cautiously approached the aperture and looked
out. Nearly the whole of the castle lay in ruins before me!
"It was easy to see what had happened. The storm had demolished the
crumbling walls of the old building, and the tower, itself frail and
tottering, stood alone, high above the prostrate ruins. If the winds
should again arise it must fall, and at any moment its shaken
foundations might give way beneath it.
"Through the hole in the wall, which had been caused by the tearing
away of some of the connection between the tower and main building, I
could look down on the ground below, covered with masses of jagged
stone; but there was no way in which I could get down. I could not
descend that perpendicular wall. If I leaped out, death would be
certain.
"As I crouched at the opening I felt the head of a dog pushed against
me. A spasm of terror ran through me, but the moment the creature
began to lick my hands I knew that I had nothing to fear from him.
Instantly my courage returned. I felt that he was my protector. I
patted his head and he renewed his caresses.
"Passing my hand over him, I found he was holding himself in his
present position by means of his forelegs, which were stretched out
upon the floor. What a dog this must be, who could climb a wall!
But I gave no time to conjectures of this sort. How could I avail
myself of his assistance? In what manner could he enable me to
escape from that dangerous tower?
"Suddenly a thought came to me. I remembered the snake part of him.
Judging from the ratio of diminution, which I have mentioned before,
that part, if hanging down, must reach nearly, if not quite, to the
ground. By taking advantage of this means of descent I might be
saved, but the feat would require dexterity and an immense amount of
faith. This serpent-like portion of the animal was invisible. How
could I know how long it was!
"But there was no time for consideration; the wind had again arisen,
and was blowing with fury. The tower shook beneath me; at any moment
it might fall. If I should again escape from death, through the
assistance of my invisible friend, I must avail myself of that
assistance instantly.
"I stopped and felt the animal. He still hung by part of his body
and by his forelegs to the floor of the dungeon, and by reaching out
I could feel that the rest of him extended downward. I therefore
seized his body in my arms, threw myself out of the aperture, and
began to slide down.
"In a very short time I found that I had reached the snake portion of
the creature, and, throwing my arms and legs around it, I endeavored
with all my strength to prevent a too rapid descent; but in spite of
all my efforts, my downward progress was faster than I would have
wished it to be. But there was no stopping; I must slip down.
"In these moments of rapid descent my mind was filled with wild
anxiety concerning the serpent-like form to which I was clinging. I
remembered in a flash that there were snakes whose caudal extremity
dwindled away suddenly into a point. This one might do so, and at
any instant I might come to the end of the tail and drop upon the
jagged stones below.
"Calculation after calculation of the ratio of diminution flashed
through my mind during that awful descent. My whole soul was
centered upon one point. When would this support end? When would I
drop?
"Fortunately I was on the leeward side of the tower, and I was not
swung about by the wind. Steadily I descended, and steadily the
diameter of the form I grasped diminished; soon I could grasp it in
my hand; then with a terrified glance I looked below. I was still at
a sickening distance from the ground. I shut my eyes. I slipped
down, down, down. The tail became like a thick rope which I
encircled with each hand. It became thinner and thinner. It grew so
small that I could not hold it; but as I felt it slip from my fingers
my feet rested on a pile of stones.
"Bewildered and almost exhausted, I stumbled over the ruins, gained
the unencumbered ground, and ran as far from the tower as I could,
sinking down at last against the trunk of a tree in a neighboring
field. Scarcely had I reached this spot when the fury of the
wind-storm appeared to redouble, and before the wild and shrieking
blast the tower bent and then fell with a crash upon the other ruins.
"The first thought that came into my mind when I beheld the dreadful
spectacle concerned the creature who had twice saved my life. Had he
escaped, or was he crushed beneath that mass of stone? I felt on
either side to discover if he were near me, but he was not. Had he
given his life for mine?
"Had I been stronger I would have searched for him; I would have
clambered among the ruins to see if I could discover his mangled
form. If I could but reach his faithful head I would stroke and
caress it, living or dead. But excitement, fatigue, and want of food
had made me so weak that I could do nothing but sit upon the ground
with my back against the tree.
"While thus resting I perceived that the whole of the tower had not
been demolished by the storm. Some of the rooms in which we had
lived, having been built at a later date than the rest of the great
edifice, had resisted the power of the wind and were still standing.
"From the direction of the uninjured portion of the castle I now saw
approaching a light-colored object, which seemed to be floating in
the air about a foot from the ground. As it came nearer I saw that
it was a basket, and I immediately understood the situation. My
faithful friend was alive, and was bringing me some refreshments.
"On came the basket, rising and falling with the bounds of the dog.
It was truly an odd spectacle, but a very welcome one. In a few
moments the basket was deposited at my side, and I was caressing the
head of the faithful dog. In the basket I found a bottle of wine and
some bread and meat, which the good creature had doubtless discovered
in the kitchen of the castle, and it was not long before I was myself
again. The storm had now almost passed away, and I arose and went to
my own rooms, my friend and protector still keeping close to my side.
"On the morning of the next day, as I sat wondering what had happened
to my servants, and whether my father had been apprised of the
disaster to the castle, I felt something pulling at the skirt of my
coat. I put out my hand and found that it was the invisible dog.
Imagining that he wished me to follow him, I arose, and, obeying the
impulse given me by his gentle strain upon my coat, I followed him
out of the door, across the courtyard, and into the open country. We
went on for a considerable distance. A gentle touch of my coat
admonished me when I turned from the direction in which it was
desired that I should go.
"After a walk of about half an hour I approached a great oak-tree,
with low, wide-spreading branches. Some one was sitting beneath it.
Imagining the truth, I rushed forward. It was Marie!
"It was needless for us to say anything, to explain the state of our
feelings toward each other. That tale was told by the delight with
which we met. When I asked her how she came to be there, she told me
that about an hour before, while sitting in front of her father's
mansion, she had felt something gently pulling at her skirts; and,
although at first frightened, she was at length impelled to obey the
impulse, and, without knowing whether it was the wind or some
supernatural force which had led her here, she had come.
"We had a great deal to say to each other. She told me that she had
been longing to send me a message to warn me that Colonel Kaldhein
would certainly kill me the next time he saw me; but she had no means
of sending me such a message, for the Colonel had had her actions
closely watched.
"When the news came of Kaldhein's death she at first feared that I
had killed him, and would therefore be obliged to fly the country;
but when it was known that he had been almost torn to pieces by wild
beasts, she, like every one else, was utterly amazed, and could not
understand the matter at all. None but the most ferocious creatures
could have inflicted the injuries of which the man had died, and
where those creatures came from no one knew. Some people thought
that a pack of blood-hounds might have broken loose from some of the
estates of the surrounding country, and, in the course of their wild
journeyings, might have met with the Colonel, and fallen upon him.
Others surmised that a bear had come down from the mountains; but the
fact was that nobody knew anything about it.
"I did not attempt to acquaint Marie with the truth. At that moment
the invisible dog was lying at my side, and I feared if I mentioned
his existence to Marie she might fly in terror. To me there was only
one important phase of the affair, and that was that Marie was now
free, that she might be mine.
"Before we parted we were affianced lovers, pledged to marry as soon
as possible. I wrote to my father, asking for his permission to wed
the lady. But in his reply he utterly forbade any such marriage.
Marie also discovered that her parents would not permit a union with
a foreigner, and would indeed oppose her marriage with any one at
this time.
"However, as usual, love triumphed, and after surmounting many
difficulties we were married and fled to America. Since that time I
have been obliged to support myself and my wife, for my father will
give me no assistance. He had proposed a very different career for
me, and was extremely angry when he found his plans had been
completely destroyed. But we are hopeful, we work hard, and hope
that we may yet be able to support ourselves comfortably without aid
from any one. We are young, we are strong, we trust each other, and
have a firm faith in our success.
"I had only one regret in leaving Europe, and that was that my
faithful friend, the noble and devoted invisible dog, was obliged to
remain on the other side of the Atlantic. Why this was so I do not
know, but perhaps it was for the best. I never told my wife of his
existence, and if she had accidentally discovered it, I know not what
might have been the effects upon her nervous system.
"The dog accompanied me through Austria, Switzerland, and France to
Havre, from which port we sailed. I took leave of him on the
gang-plank. He licked my hands, and I caressed and stroked him.
People might have thought that my actions denoted insanity, but every
one was so greatly occupied in these last moments before departure,
that perhaps I was not noticed. Just as I left him and hastened on
board, a sailor fell overboard from the gang-plank. He was quickly
rescued, but could not imagine why he had fallen. I believe,
however, that he was tripped up by the snake part of my friend as he
convulsively rushed away."
The young man ceased, and gazed pensively upon the floor.
"Well, well, well!" exclaimed Aunt Martha, "if those are the sort of
experiences you had, I don't wonder that Realism was wonderful enough
for you. The invisible creature was very good to you, I am sure, but
I am glad it did not come with you to America."
David, who had been waiting for an opportunity to speak, now
interrupted further comments by stating that it was daylight, and if
I thought well of it, he would open the window-shutters, so that we
might see any one going toward the town. A milkman, he said, passed
the house very early every morning. When the shutters were opened we
were all amazed that the night should have passed so quickly.
The tall burglar and the young man now began to exhibit a good deal
of anxiety.
"I should like very much to know," said the former, "what you intend
to do in regard to us. It cannot be that you think of placing that
young gentleman and myself in the hands of the law. Of course, this
man," pointing to the stout burglar, "cannot expect anything but a
just punishment of his crimes; but after what we have told you, you
must certainly be convinced that our connection with the affair is
entirely blameless, and should be considered as a piece of very bad
luck."
"That," said I, "is a matter which will receive all the consideration
it needs."
At this moment David announced the milkman. Counseling my man to
keep strict guard over the prisoners, I went out to the road, stopped
the milkman, and gave him a message which I was certain would insure
the prompt arrival at my house of sufficient force to take safe
charge of the burglars. Excited with the importance of the
commission, he whipped up his horse and dashed away.
When I returned to the house I besought my wife and Aunt Martha to go
to bed, that they might yet get some hours of sleep; but both
refused. They did not feel in the least like sleep, and there was a
subject on which they wished to consult with me in the dining-room.
"Now," said Aunt Martha, when the door had been closed, "these men
have freely told us their stories; whether they are entirely true or
not, must, of course, be a matter of opinion; but they have laid
their cases before us, and we should not place them all in the hands
of the officers of the law without giving them due consideration, and
arriving at a decision which shall be satisfactory to ourselves."
"Let us take them in order," said I. "What do you think of the tall
man's case?"
"I think he is a thief and manufacturer of falsehoods," said my wife
promptly.
"I am afraid," said Aunt Martha, "that he is not altogether innocent;
but there is one thing greatly in his favor--when he told of the
feelings which overcame him when he saw that little child sleeping
peacefully in its bed in the house which he had unintentionally
robbed, I felt there must be good points in that man's nature. What
do you think of him?"
"I think he is worst of the lot," I answered, "and as there are now
two votes against him, he must go to the lock-up. And now what of
the stout fellow?" I asked.
"Oh, he is a burglar by his own confession," said my wife; "there can
be no doubt of that."
"I am afraid you are right," said Aunt Martha.
"I know she is," said I, "and James Barlow, or whatever his name may
be, shall be delivered to the constable."
"Of course, there can be no difference of opinion in regard to the
young man," said Aunt Martha quickly. "Both the others admitted that
he had nothing to do with this affair except as a journalist, and
although I do not think he ought to get his realistic ideas in that
way, I would consider it positively wicked to send him into court in
company with those other men. Consider the position in which he
would be placed before the world. Consider his young wife."
"I cannot say," said my wife, "that I am inclined to believe all
parts of his story."
"I suppose," said I, laughing, "that you particularly refer to the
invisible dog-snake."
"I'm not so sure about all that," she answered. "Since the labors of
the psychic researchers began, we have heard of a great many strange
things; but it is evident that he is a young man of education and
culture, and in all probability a journalist or literary man. I do
not think he should be sent to the lock-up with common criminals."
"There!" cried Aunt Martha, "two in his favor. He must be released.
It's a poor rule that does not work both ways."
I stood for a few moments undecided. If left to myself, I would have
sent the trio to the county town, where, if any one of them could
prove his innocence, he could do so before the constitutional
authorities; but having submitted the matter to my wife and aunt, I
could not well override their decision. As for what the young man
said, I gave it no weight whatever, for of course he would say the
best he could for himself. But the testimony of the others had
weight. When they both declared that he was not a burglar, but
merely a journalist, engaged in what he supposed to be his duty, it
would seem to be a cruel thing to stamp him as a criminal by putting
him in charge of the constables.
But my indecision soon came to an end, for Aunt Martha declared that
no time should be lost in setting the young man free, for should the
people in town arrive and see him sitting bound with the others it
would ruin his character forever. My wife agreed.
"Whatever there may be of truth in his story," she said, "one of two
things is certain--either he has had most wonderful experiences out
of which he may construct realistic novels which will give him
fortune and reputation, or he has a startling imagination, which, if
used in the production of works in the romantic school, will be of
the same advantage to his future. Looking upon it, even in this
light and without any reference to his family and the possible
effects on his own moral nature, we shall assume a great
responsibility in deliberately subjecting such a person to criminal
prosecution and perhaps conviction."
This was enough. "Well," said I, "we will release the young fellow
and send the two other rascals to jail."
"That was not well expressed," said my wife, "but we will not
criticize words at present."
We returned to the library and I announced my decision. When he
heard it the stout burglar exhibited no emotion. His expression
indicated that, having been caught, he expected to be sent to jail,
and that was the end of it. Perhaps, he had been through this
experience so often that he had become used to it. The tall man,
however, took the announcement in a very different way. His face
grew dark and his eyes glittered. "You are making a great mistake,"
he said to me, "a very great mistake, and you will have to bear the
consequences."
"Very good," said I, "I will remember that remark when your trial
comes on."
The behavior of the young man was unexceptional. He looked upon us
with a face full of happy gratitude, and, as he thanked us for the
kind favor and the justice which we had shown him, his eyes seemed
dim with tears. Aunt Martha was much affected.
"I wonder if his mother is living," she whispered to me. "A wife is
a great deal, but a mother is more. If I had thought of her sooner I
would have spoken more strongly in his favor. And now you should
untie him at once and let him go home. His wife must be getting
terribly anxious."
The young man overheard this last remark.
"You will confer a great favor on me, sir," he said, "if you will let
me depart as soon as possible. I feel a great repugnance to be seen
in company with these men, as you may imagine, from wearing a mask on
coming here. If I leave immediately I think I can catch the first
train from your station."
I considered the situation. If I did what I was asked, there would
be two bound burglars to guard, three women and a child to protect,
an uncertain stranger at liberty, and only David and myself to attend
to the whole business. "No, sir," said I, "I shall not untie you
until the officers I sent for are near at hand; then I will release
you, and you can leave the house by the back way without being seen
by them. There are other morning trains which will take you into the
city early enough."
"I think you are a little hard on him," remarked Aunt Martha, but the
young man made no complaint.
"I will trust myself to you, sir," he said.
The officers arrived much sooner than I expected. There were five of
them, including the Chief of Police, and they were accompanied by
several volunteer assistants, among whom was the milkman who had been
my messenger. This morning his customers might wait for their milk,
for all business must give way before such an important piece of
sightseeing as this.
I had barely time to untie the young man and take him to the back of
the house before the officers and their followers had entered the
front door. There was now a great deal of questioning, a great deal
of explanation, a great deal of discussion as to whether my way of
catching burglars was advisable or not, and a good deal of talk about
the best method of taking the men to town. Some of the officers were
in favor of releasing the two men, and then deciding in what manner
they should be taken to town; and if this plan had been adopted, I
believe that these two alert and practical rascals would have taken
themselves out of my house without the assistance of the officers, or
at least would have caused a great deal of trouble and perhaps injury
in endeavoring to do so.
But the Chief of Police was of my mind, and before the men were
entirely released from the ropes by which I had tied them, they were
securely manacled.
A requisition made on David and myself to appear as witnesses, the
two men were taken from the house to the wagons in which the officers
and their followers had come. My wife and Aunt Martha had gone
upstairs before the arrival of the police, and were watching the
outside proceeding from a window.
Standing in the hallway, I glanced into the dining-room, and was
surprised to see the young man still standing by a side door. I had
thought him gone, but perhaps it was wise in him to remain, and not
show himself upon the road until the coast was entirely clear. He
did not see me, and was looking backward into the kitchen, a cheerful
and animated expression upon his face. This expression did not
strike me pleasantly. He had escaped a great danger, it was true,
but it was no reason for this rather obtrusive air of exultation.
Just then Alice came into the dining-room from the kitchen, and the
young man stepped back, so that she did not notice him. As she
passed he gently threw his arm quietly around her neck and kissed her.
At that very instant, even before the girl had time to exclaim, in
rushed David from the outer side door.
"I've been watching you, you rascal," he shouted; "you're done for
now!" and he threw his strong arms around the man, pinioning his arms
to his side.
The young fellow gave a great jerk, and began to struggle powerfully.
His face turned black with rage; he swore, he kicked. He made the
most frenzied efforts to free himself, but David's arms were strong,
his soul was full of jealous fury, and in a moment I had come to his
assistance. Each of us taking the young fellow by an arm, we ran him
into the hallway and out of the front door, Alice aiding us greatly
by putting her hands against the man's back and pushing most forcibly.
"Here's another one," cried David. "I'll appear against him. He's
the worst of the lot."
Without knowing what it all meant, the Chief clapped the nippers on
our prisoner, justly believing that if burglars were about to show
themselves so unexpectedly, the best thing to do was to handcuff them
as fast as they appeared, and then to ask questions. The reasons for
not having produced this man before, and for producing him now, were
not very satisfactory to the officer.
"Have you any more in the cellar?" he asked. "If so, I should like
to take a look at them before I start away."
At this moment Aunt Martha made her appearance at the front door.
"What are you going to do with that young man?" she asked sharply.
"What right have you to put irons upon him?"
"Aunt Martha," said I, stepping back to her, "what do you think he
has done?"
"I don't know," said she; "how should I know? All I know is that we
agreed to set him free."
I addressed her solemnly: "David and I believe him to be utterly
depraved. He availed himself of the first moments of his liberation
to kiss Alice." Aunt Martha looked at me with wide-open eyes, and
then her brows contracted.
"He did, did he?" said she. "And that is the kind of a man he is.
Very good. Let him go to jail with the others. I don't believe one
word about his young wife. If kissing respectable young women is the
way he studies Realism the quicker he goes to jail the better," and
with that she walked into the house.
When the men had been placed in the two vehicles in which the police
had come, the Chief and I made an examination of the premises, and we
found that the house had been entered by a kitchen window, in exactly
the manner which the tall burglar had described. Outside of this
window, close to the wall, we found a leathern bag, containing what
the Chief declared to be an excellent assortment of burglars' tools.
The officers and their prisoners now drove away, and we were left to
a long morning nap, if we were so fortunate as to get it, and a late
breakfast.
In the course of the trial of the three men who had entered my house
some interesting points in regard to them were brought out. Several
detectives and policemen from New York were present, and their
testimony proved that my three burglars were men of eminence in their
profession, and that which most puzzled the metropolitan detectives
was to discover why these men should have been willing to devote
their high talents to the comparatively insignificant business of
breaking into a suburban dwelling.
The tall man occupied a position of peculiar eminence in criminal
circles. He was what might be called a criminal manager. He would
take contracts for the successful execution of certain crimes--bank
robberies, for instance--and while seldom taking part in the actual
work of a burglary or similar operation, he would plan all the
details of the affair, and select and direct his agents with great
skill and judgment. He had never been arrested before, and the
detectives were delighted, believing they would now have an
opportunity of tracing to him a series of very important criminal
operations that had taken place in New York and some other large
cities. He was known as Lewis Mandit, and this was believed to be
his real name.
The stout man was a first-class professional burglar and nothing
more, and was in the employ of Mandit. The young man was a decidedly
uncommon personage. He was of a good family, had been educated at
one of our principal colleges, had traveled, and was in every way
qualified to make a figure in society. He had been a newspaper man,
and a writer for leading periodicals, and had shown considerable
literary ability; but a life of honest industry did not suit his
tastes, and he had now adopted knavery as a regular profession.
This man, who was known among his present associates as Sparky, still
showed himself occasionally in newspaper offices, and was generally
supposed to be a correspondent for a Western journal; but his real
business position was that of Mandit's head man.
Sparky was an expert in many branches of crime. He was an excellent
forger, a skilful lock-picker, an ingenious planner of shady
projects, and had given a great deal of earnest study to the subject
of the loopholes of the law. He had a high reputation in criminal
circles for his ability in getting his fellow-rascals out of jail.
There was reason to believe that in the past year no less than nine
men, some condemned to terms of imprisonment, and some held for
trial, had escaped by means of assistance given them by Sparky.
His methods of giving help to jail-birds were various. Sometimes
liberty was conferred through the agency of saws and ropes, at other
times through that of a habeas corpus and an incontestible alibi.
His means were adapted to the circumstances of the case, and it was
believed that if Sparky could be induced to take up the case of a
captured rogue, the man had better chance of finding himself free
than the law had of keeping him behind bars, especially if his case
were treated before it had passed into its more chronic stages.
Sparky's success was greatly due to his extremely specious manner,
and his power of playing the part that the occasion demanded. In
this particular he was even the superior of Mandit, who was an adept
in this line. These two men found no difficulty in securing the
services of proficient burglars, safe-robbers, and the like; for, in
addition to the high rewards paid these men, they were in a manner
insured against permanent imprisonment in case of misfortune. It was
always arranged that, if any of their enterprises came to grief, and
if either Mandit or Sparky should happen to be arrested, the working
miscreants should substantiate any story their superiors might choose
to tell of themselves, and, if necessary, to take upon themselves the
whole responsibility of the crime. In this case their speedy release
was to be looked upon as assured.
A great deal of evidence in regard to the character and practices of
these two men came from the stout burglar, commonly known as Barney
Fitch. When he found that nothing was to be expected from his two
astute employers, and that they were in as bad a place as himself, he
promptly turned State's evidence, and told all that he knew about
them.
It was through the testimony of this man that the motive for the
attempted robbery of my house was found out. It had no connection
whatever with the other burglaries of our neighborhood, those,
probably, having been committed by low-class thieves, who had not
broken into my house simply because my doors and windows had been so
well secured; nor had our boy, George William, any share whatever in
the protection of the household.
The burglary was undertaken solely for the purpose of getting
possession of some important law papers, which were to be used in a
case in which I was concerned, which soon would be tried. If these
papers could be secured by the opposite party, the side on which I
was engaged would have no case at all, and a suit involving a great
deal of property must drop. With this end in view the unscrupulous
defendants in the case had employed Mandit to procure the papers; and
that astute criminal manager had not only arranged all the details of
the affair, but had gone himself to the scene of action in order to
see that there should be no mistake in carrying out the details of
this most important piece of business.
The premises had been thoroughly reconnoitred by Sparky, who, a few
days before the time fixed for the burglary, had visited my house in
the capacity of an agent of a telescopic bookcase, which could be
extended as new volumes were required, therefore need never exhibit
empty shelves. The young man had been included in the party on
account of his familiarity with legal documents, it being, of course,
of paramount importance that the right papers should be secured. His
ingenuity was also to be used to cover up, if possible, all evidence
that the house had been entered at all, it being desirable to make it
appear to the court that I had never had these documents in my
possession, and that they never existed.
Had it not been for a very natural desire for refreshment that
interfered with their admirably laid plans, it is probable that the
mechanical skill of Mandit would have been equal to the noiseless
straightening of the bent bolt, and the obliteration of the scratches
and dents made by the attempts upon other shutters, and that Sparky,
after relocking all open desks or cabinets, and after the exit of the
others, would have closed and fastened the kitchen shutters, and
would then have left the house by means of an open window in the
upper hall and the roof of a piazza.
Thus it was that these three men, so eminent in their different
spheres of earnest endeavor, came to visit my comparatively humble
abode; and thus it was that they not only came to that abode, but to
the deepest grief. They were "wanted" in so many quarters, and on so
many charges, that before they had finished serving out their various
sentences their ability to wickedly avail themselves of the property
of others would have suffered greatly from disuse, and the period of
life left them for the further exercise of those abilities would be
inconveniently limited.
I was assured by a prominent detective that it had been a long time
since two such dangerous criminals as Mandit and Sparky had fallen
into the hands of the law. These men, by means of very competent
outside assistance, made a stout fight for acquittal on some of the
charges brought against them; but when they found that further effort
of this kind would be unavailing, and that they would be sentenced to
long terms of imprisonment, they threw off their masks of outraged
probity and stood out in their true characters of violent and brutal
ruffians. Barney Fitch, the cracksman, was a senior warden compared
to them.
It was a long time before my Aunt Martha recovered from her
disappointment in regard to the youngest burglar.
"Of course I was mistaken," she said. "That sort of thing will
happen; but I really had good grounds for believing him to be a
truthful person, so I am not ashamed for having taken him for what he
said he was. I have now no doubt before he fell in his wicked ways
that he was a very good writer, and might have become a novelist or a
magazine author; but his case is a very sad proof that the study of
Realism may be carried too far," and she heaved a sigh.
A Suspicious Character
BY WILLIAM HAMILTON OSBORNE
CHAPTER I
A Negro porter passed through the car making his announcement in
stentorian tones, tempered, however, by his expectant civility and
servility, for his train was the three-thirty p.m. express from Wall
Street to the shore.
"Ravenswood," he cried, "all out for Ravenswood by the Sea!"
His car was the Vashti, and in seat 9 of that car there sat a man who
for an hour had been staring absent-mindedly, perhaps dejectedly, at
the swiftly moving scenery. He was young, this man, and tall and
lithe, and well looking. But a strange pallor was upon his face; his
countenance was marked with lines of fatigue. He suffered, evidently
from jaded nerves.
As the porter reached him, this young man came suddenly to himself,
sprang to his feet, with one hand reached for his finely woven Panama
in the rack above, and with the other grabbed the porter.
"Ravenswood," he cried, "this is my stop, porter?" It was indeed a
question and not a statement of a fact. Immediately the porter shook
his head.
"Not _youah_ stop, sir, Elsmere--next station--is youah stop."
The young man sank back into his seat listlessly. He drew his hand
wearily across his face.
"Almost forgot where I'm bound for," he explained to the next
passenger, in a confused, embarrassed way. He toyed nervously with
his Panama, as though uncertain whether to replace it once more in
the rack, or to hold it, preparatory to alighting at Elsmere. All
this time the long train had been coming to a stop. Now it was
stationary before a small, artistic station, practically deserted
save for a rickety stage, and a huge, throbbing, steel-blue motor
car. The young man in seat 9 glanced at the small depot, at the
rickety stage, at the car--
Then his heart leaped into his mouth. For suddenly his glance had
lighted upon the girl in the car. He leaped forward on the instant,
gripping his chair with both hands and staring at her as though
completely fascinated, drinking in the glory of her face.
"It is she," he said softly to himself. He waited for an
imperceptible space of time and suddenly the girl looked at
him--looked him full in the face.
"She--and no mistake," he murmured. He jammed his hat well down upon
his head, seized his heavy Gladstone bag, and tore down the aisle
toward the only open door.
"All aboard," sang out the porter at the end, and the train began to
move.
"Hold on there," cried the passenger, "don't shut that door. This is
my station, after all. I've got to get out."
By the time he reached the platform, the train had picked up
considerable speed, and the porter tried to detain him, but without
success. He jerked himself away, swung free, and dashed down the
steps.
"Lawdy, boss," yelled the porter, "look out--they's another train
a-comin'--another train."
But the passenger never heard. Once on terra firma, he forgot that
trains existed. He sought and found the face--the girl he was
looking for, and as a mariner steers by a fixed star, so did the
lithe young man follow his straight course across three sets of
railroad tracks, toward the steel-blue car. In his ears, it is true,
he heard the porter's warning:
"-- th' other train, boss, on th' up track. Lawsy. Look out."
But he heard it only with his ears. The warning did not sink in. He
did not realize that upon one of the three tracks which he was
crossing, an express, bound cityward, was pounding its way at the
rate of sixty miles an hour, coming nearer to him every instant,
threatening him with instant destruction. He did not see it, did not
hear it. The porter's warning droned away in the distance. And the
passenger kept on--kept on, gladly realizing that his intuition had
been correct, that the girl was lovelier every step he took. He had
hoped, somehow to hold her gaze. But she had turned her head and was
glancing intently at something to his left. He followed her glance,
and his eye lighted upon three well dressed men, also crossing the
tracks--men who seemed to have dropped from the clouds. These three
men were bearing down upon him, following the porter's tactics,
waving their arms and shouting violently.
"Express--express," they yelled.
The foremost of these three well dressed men made a sudden dash
toward the tall young passenger, as one who would rescue him at the
risk of his own life, but the young passenger merely held to his
course, his glance returning to the girl.
She was looking at him now, and upon her face there was a look of
horror. She saw, then, what he had refused to see, the imminent
danger in which he was, and acting on the impulse of the moment, she
rose in her car and beckoned to him to come, to come at once. His
face lighted up, and he quickened his pace, and swung clear of the
last steel rail.
Then with a roar like thunder, the meteor swept past him, almost,
sucking him into its mighty swirl. By some strange circumstance he
had escaped where escape had seemed impossible. On the other side of
the express three men fell back and, by common consent, they mopped
their respective brows.
"Thunder," exclaimed one, the man who had dashed upon him--"I figured
that we'd both be ground to mincemeat. Closest squeak I ever had, I
tell you."
But the object of their solicitude gave no sign of their nervousness.
Gladstone in hand, he swarmed up the terraced bank, and strode softly
to the side of the car. He removed his hat and bowed to the girl.
"You beckoned to me--and I came," he stammered, in confusion. The
girl was hiding her face in her hands and quivering hysterically.
She turned her scared face toward him. "You were in--such terrible
danger," she cried, "I had to--do something."
For the first time he looked at the express as it dashed into the
distance, and for the first time he realized the situation.
Instinctively he held out his hand--an act in which both he and she
recognized as wholly without the conventions, but she, quite as
impulsively, held out hers and permitted him to take it for an
instant. There was silence--deep silence for a moment.
"You saved my life," he told her.
She shook her head. "I think you saved your own, by your coolness in
keeping right on," she answered, "don't make a heroine of me.
Besides, down there is a hero--he risked his life in trying to save
you. I saw it all."
The young passenger started down the bank and met the three men as
they came up. Gratefully he murmured his thanks to them, rebuking
himself to them, for his stupidity and his blundering in getting into
danger. The hero that the girl had pointed out, merely shrugged his
shoulders and stated, unconcernedly, in a rather rough and ready tone
that belied the Wall Street clothes he wore, that it was all in a
lifetime and there was nothing to pay. Whereupon he of the Panama
hat went back to the girl.
"Would you mind telling me," he asked, "where those chaps came from?"
She was cooler now--and colder, too. Civilly enough, she evinced a
purpose to end the conversation but she answered him categorically.
"They jumped off your train," she told him. "It seemed to me,
somehow, that they jumped because you got off."
"Do they belong here?" he queried. She shook her head, and turned to
her chauffeur.
"You can go on, Henri," she exclaimed. "He's missed his train. He
won't be down now until the five o'clock."
The chauffeur cranked his machine, and prepared to start. But the
young man still detained him.
"One thing more," he asked of her, "can you direct me to the best
hotel in Ravenswood?"
She nodded graciously enough, but kept her eyes upon the distances,
as one who would discourage a conversation involuntarily begun.
"There is only one hotel," she answered, "the Ravenswood Inn. The
stage will take you there."
Henri, the chauffeur, threw in the clutch, and she bowled away. The
passenger strode to the stage, clambered in. The three unknowns were
already ahead of him, clustered up in front near the driver, smoking
black cigars and telling witty stories. The minute he had swung
aboard, the driver lashed his horses, and the dilapidated conveyance,
like some weather-beaten craft tossed on turbulent seas, lurched and
staggered toward its destination.
The man with the Gladstone looked at the three men, but mused upon
the girl.
"I wonder who she is," he asked himself, "and who is coming down upon
the five o'clock."
As they teetered on, scraps of conversation from the three ahead,
forced their way into his inner consciousness, and he found himself
sizing up his three companions with considerable interest. At first
blush, he had taken them for Wall Street men. But as he looked and
listened, he realized his mistake. He knew Wall Street well, and he
knew men well, and he knew, instinctively, that these men were not
Wall Street men, and further, realized that they were
masquerading--that they were not what they seemed. Besides, there
was something familiar in their appearance--where had he seen them
before? And then like a flash, it came to him.
"They were the three I brushed against in front of the Tombs to-day,"
he told himself.
But his speculations went no farther, for the seaside Jehu had
brought his vehicle to a full stop under a ponderous _porte cochère_,
and the tall young passenger found himself clambering awkwardly out.
"Ravenswood Inn, gents," said the driver, "an'--twenty cents apiece."
A uniformed attendant seized the Gladstone and deposited it within a
discreet distance of the desk, giving the clerk some idea of the
amount of luggage carried by the guest.
The clerk bowed to the young man, and nodded to the three who came
behind.
"Together or separate?" he asked.
"I'm separate," smiled he of the Gladstone. He took the pen that the
clerk handed him, leaned over the register and for the first time,
hesitated before he wrote his name. His glance strayed toward his
bag, and riveted itself upon two black letters that appeared upon its
side: "O.P."
Then he turned back to the register and scribbled a signature: "Oscar
Pearson, New York City," was what he wrote.
"Most of my baggage," he explained, "went on to Elsmere--booked for
the Hotel Sandringham. Will you send and get it, please?"
The clerk nodded. "Glad to benefit by your change of mind,
Mr.--er--Pearson," he exclaimed. The new guest, Mr. Pearson, did not
answer at once. Through the broad doors that led to the Ocean Drive
he saw something that attracted his attention--something that sent
the color into his pale face. Then he looked once more at the clerk.
"Yes--so am I," he said.
The formalities over, he strolled out upon the broad, low-roofed
veranda.
"I thought so," he whispered to himself. He smiled gently at the
something that had attracted his attention. That something was
nothing more nor less than a steel-blue motor car, with Henri
lounging in the chauffeur's seat.
But the girl had disappeared.
II
He had been quite right about the three pseudo Wall Street men who
had registered with him at the Inn.
For at half past ten o'clock that very morning this young man of the
Gladstone bag--he who had registered as Pearson--had slowly descended
the outer steps of the Tombs in Centre Street, New York. Three men
had unquestionably been waiting for him to come out, for they had
skulked about the street, dodged about corners, stood in doorways,
walked up and down singly and together, for half an hour or more.
And when he had come out, running, singularly enough, plump into
them, they had been more or less startled by his appearance. His
face was unnaturally pale--and a new, anxious, worried, harried look
was fixed upon it.
Prom the Tombs he had stepped into a taxicab, and given a brief
direction:
"783 West 73rd."
The three in their taxicab had trailed him, and had seen his cab pull
up at 783 West 73rd, and had seen him get out. They knew an instant
later, that he was consulting McIntyre, M.D., the only real nerve
specialist in the world--and in their way, they were professionally
glad that he was seeking medical attention.
"Needs it bad enough," the three said among themselves, "looks like a
shadow, so he does."
Inside No. 783 their quarry sat facing McIntyre, a little bearded man
with glasses.
"But I can't go away," he was protesting at the suggestion of the
specialist.
The latter only smiled. "But you are going away, whether you can or
can't. If you don't, you'll be dead inside of three months. I've
kept track of you in the newspapers, and I know what you've been
through. Well, you've got to quit, and rest--and when I say rest, I
mean it. Don't go to Newport or Narragansett Pier."
"Thank Heaven for that," murmured the younger man, "where shall I go?"
The specialist ransacked a little drawer for a memo, that he needed.
Finally he found it. "This is the place," he said at last, "Jersey
Shore, Elsmere--the Sandringham Hotel. Quiet. Family place. No
excitement. High class. Good food and lots of salt water bathing.
That's the place for you." He leaned over and touched his patient on
the knee. "Don't let anybody know where you are," he said, "give
them the slip. That's my advice. Forget that you are who you are,
and don't let anybody know it. That's the trick. Do as I say, or--"
His young patient, with his characteristic gesture, had drawn a hand
across his face.
"Just left the Tombs half an hour ago," he began. But the physician
waved his hand.
"Never mind about the Tombs," he said, "I don't care anything about
the Tombs, or about anything else, and you don't either. You forget
the Tombs--forget the newspapers, and the bank, and everybody. Just
take care of yourself. Why don't you get married? Your wife would
take care of you. Haven't you ever thought of getting married? Eh?"
His patient had flushed. "Yes," he stammered in reply, "I
have--But--"
"But what?" persisted the specialist.
"She has never turned up," explained the other, "I've been looking
for her for months and months and months--"
"For--whom? Have you seen her--lost her?"
His patient shook his head. "I've never found her yet," he went on,
"all that I know is, that I'll know her when I see her."
"And--what then?" laughed the elder man.
"Then," said his patient earnestly, "then I'll marry her."
"Oho, you will, will you? How do you know you will? How do you know
she'll like you? How do you know she won't be spoken for--married
maybe?"
The other man shook his head. "I never thought of that," he said.
The physician rose and slapped him on the back. "Boy," he exclaimed,
"you're just as sound as a dollar--strong as an ox, if it wasn't for
fag. All you need is rest, and you've got to promise that you'll
follow my directions and begin right now. You'll go away to-day?"
"All right," assented the other, "I suppose I've got to, haven't I?"
He pressed McIntyre's hand, passed out, re-entered his taxi, and rode
away--with three men trailing behind him.
He had literally obeyed the specialist--up to the moment that he had
seen the girl from the window of the parlor car. Then he had
deviated into a path of his own choosing. And here he was on the
veranda of the Ravenswood Inn, staring interestedly at the steel-blue
motor car.
"I wonder," he thought to himself, "if she is already spoken
for--married, for instance. That would be awkward."
He fell to musing about this probable misfortune, and the lines
settled back into his face. There kept throbbing through his
overtaxed nerves a new and vital cause for worriment.
"It can't be," he told himself, "for, didn't she beckon to me--the
fates must have arranged that part, at least."
A bell boy touched him on the arm.
"Mr. Pearson," he exclaimed.
The guest started. "Who?" he demanded. "Who is Mr. Pearson and what
does he want?"
"Beg pardon, sir, thought you were Mr. Pearson."
"So I am, so I am," answered the guest hastily, "what do you want?"
"Gemmen to see you, sir--in the office, sir. Shall I send him out?"
"No, I'll go in," returned the guest named Pearson.
In the office, waiting for him, there stood an individual with a
pointed black Van Dyke beard--a man whom he had never seen before.
This individual held out a cordial hand.
"You're the man I'm looking for," he said, "I was afraid at first,
you weren't. I'm Dr. Crocheron from across the way. I've been
requested to take a look at you, if you don't mind." Oscar Pearson
was perplexed. "Who asked you to take a look at me?" he queried.
Dr. Crocheron smiled mysteriously. "You called on Dr. McIntyre in
little old New York to-day, didn't you, Mr.--er--Pearson?"
Pearson was relieved. "Ah, to be sure--so he's keeping his eye on
me--to see that I'm following directions." Then he stopped. "But I
didn't follow his directions," he exclaimed suddenly. "I was to go
to Elsmere, whereas I came to Ravenswood, instead. How did you know?"
The local practitioner shrugged his shoulder. "I treat everybody in
both places," he returned, "news travels fast."
Pearson moved toward the elevator. "Come up to my room and have a
smoke," he said. The physician complied, and the two men sat down in
an upper window for the space of a quarter of an hour and listened to
the beating of the surf along the shore.
They chatted in a desultory fashion. "The only thing I wanted to
warn you against, Mr.--er--Pearson," said the doctor finally, "is the
drinking water down here. It's rotten bad."
"Will it make me sick?"
"Quick as a wink."
Pearson laughed. "Then why do you warn me?" he queried. "If you
hadn't warned me, it would have made me sick, and that would have
added to your fees."
The physician tossed over a card. "Crocheron Spring Water is what
you want to drink," he remarked.
"Crocheron," mused Pearson, "why, that's your name."
The local man nodded. "I get it two ways," he admitted, "if they
drink my water they have to pay for it--and if they don't drink it,
they have to pay for it. Not a bad idea."
He started from the room. "Take good care of yourself, Mr. Pearson,"
he commented, "I've got to leave you. I've got a patient on this
floor--other end of the hall. A Mrs. Ingraham--asthma. See you
later. Good day."
The guest, Oscar Pearson, descended once more to the low-roofed
veranda. When he reached there, the steel-blue motor car was nowhere
in sight. But even while he smoked, pacing up and down, it hove into
view along the Ocean Drive, and finally drew up at the _porte
cochère_ of the Inn. The girl alighted, for she was in the car. And
so did her companion--a big, broad-shouldered, ruddy faced individual
with prosperity stamped all over him.
"Old enough to be her father, confound him," mused Pearson.
Without looking to the right or left, the girl swept on into the big
hall, and her big companion followed suit.
Pearson, strolling past, saw out of the tail of his eye, that the two
had waylaid Dr. Crocheron, as that eminent gentleman was coming down
the stairs.
"Better, much better," was the doctor's comment.
As he came out on the veranda Pearson buttonholed him.
"Doctor," he asked, "who is that big chap, anyway?"
Crocheron smiled. "He's Ingraham, the Cleveland banker. You ought
to meet him."
"I certainly ought," went on Pearson, "and--who's the girl?"
Crocheron laughed. "That's the way the wind sets, is it," he
exclaimed, "the girl is his daughter--she's too good for Cleveland,
let me tell you that, and too good for Ravenswood. Her places are
Manhattan Borough and the Pier. But the old man comes here because
it's quiet, and because it gives his wife--she's my patient--a rest
from keeping house. And the girl--" the doctor drew a long sigh.
"You know her?" queried Pearson.
"Yes, I know her," responded the physician, "that is, I have been
introduced to her, but she is as cool as a cucumber." His eyes
narrowed. "Funny thing, Mr. Pearson, I've known that girl for two
seasons, and I've known other men who know her, but she's just the
same to all of us, and I've figured out that they're waiting--she and
the old man and the old lady--just holding back and waiting for the
right man to come along. And I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts that
when he does come along, he'll be the man that the old man wants and
the old lady, too. My notion of the girl is that she'll stand for
anybody that her family pick out."
Pearson flushed and smiled. "Do you know," he said, "I've formed
quite a different opinion of Miss Ingraham."
"Do you know her?" asked the doctor hastily.
"No," stammered Pearson, "I've only seen her, but my view is that the
old man and the old lady can go to thunder, so far as she is
concerned, when she makes up her mind."
The doctor crooked his finger. "I'll let you in on something, Mr.
Pearson," he confidently went on, "the girl does what her father
says, and the old man does what his wife says, and the old lady is
stuck on anybody that's got a good new remedy for her malady."
"What's her malady?" asked Pearson.
"Never you mind," retorted the doctor, "I'm the man that's going to
cure her."
"I should like to know the girl," said Pearson, quite casually.
Dr. Crocheron nodded. "There's a hop here to-morrow night, Mr.
Pearson," he said, "I always take them in. I'll be here and I'll
introduce you. Maybe you'll help fill in the time until the right
man shows up."
"Until to-morrow night," said Pearson.
"To-morrow night," echoed the doctor, striding away.
When he had reached the far corner of the hotel, he waved his hand
before he turned it.
"I wonder who the deuce that fellow Pearson is," he thought, "somehow
they're mighty particular about him."
And as for that fellow Pearson, he stood staring into the vistas,
with an unlighted cigar in his hand.
"I shouldn't wonder," he said to himself, "if the right man had come
along."
Now, in justice to this man Pearson, be it said, that not for one
instant had he expected the girl to renew the enforced acquaintance
so strangely begun at the railway station, without the observance of
the usual conventions, nor for one instant had he contemplated an
attempt to force himself upon her. He saw, therefore, in the
sprightly young Dr. Crocheron, the thin edge of the wedge. But it
was not the doctor, after all, who introduced him to the girl. That
office was performed by an individual of much greater importance, for
Pearson was still pacing the veranda when Ingraham, the Cleveland
banker, once more entered the arena of events.
He waddled to a settee, tossed upon it all the New York evening
papers, leaned back with a sigh of satisfaction, and also viewed the
vista that Pearson had been contemplating.
Pearson trembled. It's a delicate matter to strike up an
acquaintance, at any time, with a gentleman of prosperous appearance,
and if Pearson ever had been master of the art, his art now forsook
him. He went at it much in the same way that he had approached the
girl.
He paced back and forth in front of the banker and finally faced him.
"Down on the five o'clock, sir?" he inquired.
The banker swept the young man with his glance, and then turned away.
"Um," he murmured, and picked up one of his afternoon editions and
buried his face in it.
This brought Pearson to his senses. He knew he had made a mistake in
making the slightest advances to the old gentleman, for the old
gentleman ignored his presence as completely as though he were ten
miles away. But experience had taught him that there was a way to
remedy this mistake. He therefore seated himself upon the other end
of the settee and smoked silently and in meditation for many minutes.
Suddenly the Cleveland banker threw up his head and snorted.
"Confound these New York banks," he cried, "They're countrymen."
He looked at Pearson and waited for an answer.
"I say they're countrymen," repeated the old gentleman.
Pearson gave no sign.
This brought the old gentleman up all standing. For the first time
he looked Pearson over to determine what manner of young upstart this
might be, who declined to respond to a civil question from a
Cleveland banker.
He started slightly, for he had recognized the fact that Pearson,
stranger as he was, at least bore earmarks of a gentleman, so he
tried it on again.
"They don't know enough to go in when it rains," he added. Pearson
gave no sign.
This indifference made a deep impression upon the older man. He had
supposed when Pearson first addressed him, that Pearson, by reason of
that fact, must be his inferior. Pearson's present complacent
ignoring of him now, produced quite the opposite impression. He was
convinced that the stranger must be somebody quite superior, for he
could not recall, in all his prosperous middle west career, that
anybody had ever withstood his own advances.
But there was one thing that he had not noticed, that at the mention
of the New York banks, the face of the young stranger slightly
flushed. But the old man kept on with persistence.
"What do you think of it, sir?" he bellowed.
The younger man turned to him with a startled glance. "I beg your
pardon, sir," he returned, "were you addressing me?"
The old man's tones were those of one who crawled. "I was just
reading the account of this Tri-State robbery," he ventured. "The
Tri-State Trust Company must have been crazy to let a thing like that
happen under its nose."
This time the young stranger nodded complacently, but his face now
turned exceedingly pale.
"You're delving into rather ancient history, Mr.--
"Ingraham, of Cleveland, sir," exclaimed the other, "that's my name,
Ingraham."
Pearson smiled. "Has the news of the Tri-State robbery just filtered
through to Cleveland?" he inquired.
"No," snorted the banker, "I read about it--and you read about
it--and everybody read about it, six weeks ago, but I see by the
_Post_ they have just let their paying teller out on bail."
"What was the bail?" asked Pearson.
"Fifty thousand," said the banker.
"Pretty stiff," said Pearson, "no wonder it took him six weeks to get
it."
"It's not enough," returned the other. "That chap stole a couple of
hundred thousand if he stole a cent, and I want to tell you if I was
a depositor or stockholder in the Tri-State Trust, I'd rip up the
management from the president down to the runners, for letting a
fellow get away with that much coin."
The young stranger shrugged his shoulders. "They say the Tri-State
Trust is as solid as a rock," he ventured.
"Well, then, they ought to change their management," said he, of
Cleveland. "Here's this young paying teller--they hadn't had him for
more than five years--takes all that stuff out of the bank, walks
out, by George, in broad daylight, packs the stuff in somebody else's
suit case, steals the suit case from an officer of the bank, and then
like a fool runs away with some woman, and they caught him. No
wonder they caught him--blamed idiot, with that suit case and the
initials on it and his giving the name of Oliver Partridge to suit
the initials on the case, why a ten year old could have caught him."
At the other end of the settee the man Pearson was turning paler
still.
"You must confess, sir," he replied, "that the teller was pretty
slick, at any rate."
"Well," admitted the old man grumblingly, "he was slick in everything
but running away with that woman that he did. She gave him up and
made money by it too. I want to tell you," he went on, "that things
happen in New York that would never happen in my town of Cleveland,
nor in my bank."
The young man rose sniffing the salt air. Once or twice he passed
his hand over his face with that weary gesture that seemed part and
parcel of him. He drew out his cigar case and passed it over to his
new found friend, but on opening it discovered it was empty.
"I beg your pardon," he went on, "but I have some Duodecimos up in my
room, if you wouldn't mind stepping up there, sir."
The old man responded genially. "I'd walk a mile to get a
Duodecimo," he said.
Together they strolled up to the young stranger's room. No sooner
had they entered it than the young man's eyes lighted upon his
Gladstone bag, with the initials O.P. painted in glaring black
letters. He stooped hastily, swung the bag about and turned the
initials to the wall. Then he rang for the waiter, and the banker of
Cleveland and the mysterious young stranger from New York sat down
for a half hour's talk.
Suddenly Pearson pricked up his ears. For sometime a peculiar
rasping noise had penetrated into the room from some adjoining
apartment.
"They must have a rhinoceros--or an elephant--or an ostrich--or a
whole menagerie, in that room," he exclaimed, after a long silence.
But the Cleveland banker, warmed by the genial contents of a decanter
and soothed by the Duodecimos, merely shook his head.
"That is neither an elephant, nor a menagerie, nor an ostrich," he
informed his host.
"What is it, then?" demanded Pearson.
"That," said the banker, "is Mrs. Ingraham, my wife."
Pearson apologized profusely. "I certainly meant nothing
disrespectful, sir," he exclaimed. "But may I ask you, is she ill?"
The banker waved his hand. "It's chronic, sir," he returned. "A
case of asthma, she suffers like the dickens."
The eyes of his young host brightened. "You don't say so," he
replied, "and can't the doctor help her?"
"She's got one now," returned the banker, "that she swears by. Local
man, Crocheron. He's been treating her for three summers
here--that's why she comes here. She thinks he'll cure her in the
end."
"And you?" asked Pearson.
"Not a bit of it," returned the banker. "I've got no faith in any of
them. By the way," he added, "sometime I'd like to have you meet the
missus and Miss Ingraham."
"Miss Ingraham?" queried Pearson politely.
"My daughter," said the banker, "I want you to know them. By the
way, where are you from?"
"I'm a New Yorker," responded Pearson.
"And your business?' asked the other.
"Um," said Pearson, slowly, "Well, to tell the truth, I've always
been connected with a bank."
"By George," exclaimed the old man, "then you can tell me what I want
to know. My bank is looking for a new line of New York credit.
Maybe you can help me. Who can tell?"
"I should be very glad to, sir," said Pearson.
He strolled to the window and looked out. Across the way on the
board walk three men were lounging. They were natty, well dressed,
up to date. From time to time they glanced toward the Inn.
They were the three men, be it said, who had leapt from the moving
train behind the New York stranger that very afternoon.
III
Mr. Cutty Wortman, of the Borough of Manhattan, expanded his chest
with pride. He glanced with considerable complacency at his shining
shirt front.
"It was little Cutty pulled these glad rags out o' the wreck, Red,"
he remarked, "you was against it. When we made the get-away, it was
you who lost your nut, it was me who held me nerve. It was me knowed
then just as I'm tellin' you now, that there ain't no place that's
closed to a couple of guys that is rigged in a clawhammer swallow
tail full dress evenin' clothes, specially at a swell summer joint
like this." Mr. Cutty Wortman paused as though for a reply. There
was none save for the incessant pounding of the incoming sea and the
distant strains of the string orchestra at the Inn, for though Mr.
Wortman was of the Borough of Manhattan, he was not in it. He was,
in fact, at least sixty miles away from that old-fashioned town,
lounging genteelly upon half of a board walk bench. The other half
was occupied by his bosom friend, Mr. Red Cullen, also of New York.
His bosom, also, was in glittering expansive evidence. In front of
them stretched a narrow strip of white sand, and then the sea in its
majestic mystery. Behind them was the glitter of lights that railway
time-tables designated as Ravenswood, N.J. Past Mr. Cullen and his
friend surged the summer crowd, in pairs--always in pairs. The moon
cast a shimmering radiance over all and its rays were caught and cast
back from two glossy shirts as from a mirror.
"Say," persisted Mr. Wortman, nudging his friend, "Where would we've
been, if it hadn't been for me."
Mr. Cullen merely grunted. "Go on," he cried at length, "we'd have
been dippin' for supers on Broadway, and makin' money at it. See."
By which remark, Mr. Red Cullen meant to intimate that the art of
relieving metropolitan citizens of their gold time-pieces, was still
in its prime. "We'd 'a' made a barrel of money by this time," he
complained.
"Huh," said Mr. Wortman, "we'd look swell on Broadway--every cop on
every corner with his eyes peeled for us after that last get-away,
and Lord knows how many plain clothes pounders after us an'--"
"Plain clothes," retorted his companion, "that's what we need, plain
clothes an' nothin' else. Look at this crowd on this here board
walk--white flannels an' such. There ain't a glad rag in the bunch.
An' as for dicers--say," he cried, as he eyed Mr. Wortman's headgear
in disgust, "there ain't a brown derby in the bunch."
Mr. Cutty Wortman caught his companion's burly arm in a mighty grip.
"No," he returned, "you're pickin' now. And what I say is don't you
pick. I'm doing this. Of course," he commented, "you don't see glad
rags on the walk, but you wait till nine o'clock till the hop begins
up there. Then we'll go up and we'll find a whole bunch o' full
dress suits and brown derbys there, see if we don't. And besides you
know why we're here and who we've got to do."
Red Cullen slewed about in his seat and glanced longingly at the
Ravenswood Inn. It was a massive structure, was the Inn, with small
balconies in abundance on every floor. Red Cullen sighed. "Gee," he
complained, "I wish we had Nice Kelly with us. What a bloomin' busy
place for a second story man. Nice Kelly would certainly fit in--"
Cutty Wortman was seized with a fit of silent laughter. "He would be
a six story man when he finished up," laughed he. Suddenly with a
new and more insistent grip, his brawny hand tightened upon Red
Cullen's wrist.
"By George, Kiddo," he whispered, "Here comes our meat. Watch out."
Red Cullen sniffed in momentary excitement. "Show him to me," he
exclaimed. He followed the gaze of Mr. Cutty Wortman and noted that
it rested upon two figures that had stepped suddenly from the
darkness into the full glare of an electric light. They were coming
from the Ravenswood Inn. They were headed for the board walk.
"The swell," whispered Cutty Wortman, "now who was right about glad
rags? Watch out."
They watched out. The man they watched was a tall, cleanly built,
clean cut chap, who swung along with a certain lithe grace, due
partly to his shoulders and his slenderness, and partly to the
careful cut of his dinner coat, for he too, affected a shirt front.
Beside him swung along a girl--a girl who somehow seemed a fit mate
for him.
It is due, however, to the business fidelity of Messrs. Wortman and
Cullen to say here and now that though their eyes devoured the man,
they totally ignored the girl.
Red Cullen grunted in the ear of his companion. "Are you sure?" he
queried. "Sure," replied Wortman _sotto voce_. "I tell you he
carried the biggest roll I ever see anywheres, and he's always got it
with him. Maybe you never heard of a walkin' treasury. Well, you're
looking at one now."
After that, the moon, the crowds, the sea, the sand, everything faded
from the view of the two men on the bench. They became oblivious to
everything save this--a dark-clad figure stalking by the side of a
slender white one.
And as for the dark clad figure the night was playing tricks with
him, for it seemed to him as though he could see nothing save the
eyes of the girl beside him, hear nothing save her voice, feel
nothing save the unconscious pressure of her shoulder against his.
But, unfortunately, his conversation did not match his state of mind.
"Do you think that Crocheron--doctor fellow, is doing your mother any
good?" he queried.
"Oh," answered the girl, "if anybody can do her any good, he can, I
am sure. He is a terribly clever specialist, I think."
"You don't say," returned the young man, coldly, "and yet he's been
three summers at it, hasn't he?"
"Yes," she answered, "but mother has been at it for thirty summers,
and he's done her more good than anybody else."
"Well," grumbled her companion, "I'm no specialist, but I want to
tell you that my Aunt Charlotte--"
"I beg your pardon," said the girl, "your Aunt who?"
"Aunt Charlotte," replied he. "Stunning name, isn't it?"
The girl shivered. "It's a trifle more graceful than your own," she
answered gaily.
"Great Scott," he answered, "don't you like my name? Don't you like
the name of Oscar?"
The girl glanced daringly at him. "Do you want me to tell you
something," she began frankly. There was some strange quiver in her
voice that riveted his attention immediately.
"Yes," he said eagerly.
"Not now," she returned, "go on, tell me about your Aunt Charlotte."
"My Aunt Charlotte," he laughed, "is the dearest, most strait-laced
proposition in the family, but she was possessed of a few devils.
That little old maid had nothing but hay fever, colds in the head,
asthma, and very likely membranous croup, but asthma was her pet.
The point is that she doesn't have it any more."
"What cured her?" asked the girl.
"That's telling," responded Pearson, "and besides it's a secret--Aunt
Charlotte's secret and mine. All I can say is it was a cure Aunt
Charlotte didn't want to take. She had to break one of her most
stringent commandments and was compelled to adopt a method that
placed her, in her mind, in the ranks of a third rate actress. I
wonder how the old--your mother, Mrs. Ingraham, would feel about it."
Impulsively the girl laid a hand upon his arm. "I think mother would
go through anything to be cured," she said.
"Maybe I can help her," went on Pearson. "If she is willing to take
just what Aunt Charlotte did and bear the brunt. To this day Aunt
Charlotte claims that her hopes of reaching Heaven have been
seriously disturbed--" He broke off suddenly. "I interrupted you,"
he said. "Tell me what you were going to tell me when Aunt Charlotte
butted in upon our conversation."
They had reached the end of the board walk and the girl was about to
turn back when he held out his hand.
"Do you mind walking on the sand," he asked, "on down there, toward
Old Beach?"
The girl glanced back toward the Inn. "We're a long way from home,"
she faltered, for she felt that her disapproving mother was rocking
impatiently and with gasps, to and fro, in one of the big front
rooms, and she had told her mother that she would be gone for a half
hour and she was now upon her second hour with the young stranger who
had jumped from the moving train and nearly lost his life the day
before.
"I know," he answered, to her protest, "but it's summer, there's a
moon, and the beach is as firm as asphalt. Come."
They descended the steps and strolled along the beach.
"Now, what were you going to tell me?" he persisted.
Again the girl darted toward him a daring glance. "I was going to
tell you," she half whispered, "that the only thing I don't like
about you is your name."
"What part of my name," he queried, "is it that you don't like, the
first part or the last part?"
"Oscar," she exclaimed.
"Well," he answered lightly, "let's take another name. How is
Oliver?"
"Never," said the girl.
"Ordway, then," he ventured.
She smiled and nodded. "Ordway is not bad," she admitted. "Ordway
will do."
"For the present," he went on, "you can call me Ordway."
"For the present," she said, "I shall call you Mr. Pearson."
"Now," he asked, "is that all you had to say?"
"I can't think of any more," she answered.
"Then," he went on, "let me tell you something, let me tell you the
history of my jumping off that train. It's a short history, but it's
true. This was not my station. I merely looked up and out of the
window of my car and saw you, and then I jumped off. Do you believe
me?" he asked suddenly.
The girl tried to force a laugh. "I don't know that it signifies,"
she answered.
"Yes, it signifies," he went on breathlessly, "and this is a question
that you must answer, for there was just one instant yesterday when
you looked at me as I crossed the tracks that gave me the right to
say the things I do. Do you believe in love at first sight?" he
asked abruptly.
The girl drew herself up unconsciously. "You are getting to be very
ridiculous, Mr. Pearson," she returned.
"In nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of one thousand," he went
on, "I should be. This happens to be the thousandth case. It's the
one case that's not ridiculous, Say, look here," he blurted out, "I
don't believe your eyes were telling fibs yesterday afternoon when
the 3:30 pulled in, and I don't believe you're going to pick out some
fellow, whose name is not Oscar, just because the old--I mean, just
because your father and your mother tell you to."
The girl drew back. "Why, where did you get this fund of
information, Mr. Pearson?" she inquired.
"Never mind," he went on desperately. "I want to tell you something
about myself. Ever since I was knee high to a grasshopper, I have
been pushed--and pushed--and pushed. I've worked like a slave all my
life up to now, and the older I got the harder I worked. I've
thought of girls--lots of girls--girls by the dozens, but I've never
had time to think of _the_ girl." He drew his hand across his face
again. With all his apparent confusion and enthusiasm, there still
was upon him some terrible weariness that told. "I'm fagged out," he
went on, "it's nerves. I didn't know I had any until the last two
months."
"That's why you've been so white," the girl said suddenly.
"Yes," he answered, "and you've noticed that."
She nodded. "The sun did wonders with you to-day."
He went on. "They told me I had to go away," he said, "and I went on
the first vacation, the first real one, that I've ever had. I little
knew that I was going to look out of a car window and see you and
know--"
The girl shivered. She well knew she had no right to listen to all
this, which from any other man would have seemed to her like twaddle.
She felt, too, that a portly figure, gasping in a rocking chair, back
at the Inn, was forcing itself upon her consciousness. Yet there was
something about this man, this Oscar Pearson, that drew her out of
herself. She could not seem to hold him entirely at arm's length.
"Go on," she faltered, but he didn't answer. There was a reason for
it. He could not answer, for at that instant two burly figures
hurled themselves through the air, dropping as from the heavens, upon
this Oscar Pearson, and bore him to the ground.
"A-r-r-hh," he gurgled, for they had him by the throat, these two.
"Breast pocket, you dub," muttered Mr. Cutty Wortman of New York, for
it was indeed he--Mr. Cutty Wortman and his friend Mr. Cullen--strong
arm men par excellence.
The girl stood as though petrified--but for one instant only. Then
she uttered a piercing shriek that might have reached the heavens.
"I'll take care of her," said Red, "you do the rest." And it is due
to Mr. Cutty Wortman and to Red to state that on his part Mr. Wortman
tried to "do the rest" and Mr. Red Cullen tried to "take care of the
girl." But as a matter of fact he did not take care of her and as a
matter of fact Mr. Cutty Wortman did not do the rest, for at the
girl's shriek a strange thing happened.
Three men--three other men sprang immediately into view, and even as
the strong arm men had dropped from the heavens, these three seemed
to leap from the earth, and as well working parts of one machine,
they closed in upon Cutty Wortman and his friend and bore them to the
earth, and then the battle raged--a noble warfare.
At its end, two very much crumpled shirt fronts and four very black
eyes were tied together and marched along the beach. One man drove
them in front of him at the muzzle of a gun, the other two stepped to
the side of Oscar Pearson.
"Much hurt, sir," they inquired.
"Not a bit of it," answered he, "and much obliged."
"Come on, sir," they exclaimed, "we'll see you safely home."
But Pearson was staring wildly about him. "Where--where is she?" he
inquired, dazed.
"Beg pardon, sir?" said one of the men.
"She," cried Pearson, in alarm, "I had a lady with me. Wait, here
she is."
He was quite right. She had slumped into a little white heap on the
sand--had fainted dead away.
"We were not thinking of the lady, sir," said one, "beg your pardon,
sir."
She regained consciousness in an instant, and regained it only to
find herself lying somehow in his arms.
"H-H-Helen," he was stammering, very clumsily, but very earnestly,
and so softly that only she might hear, "you won't forget that it was
first sight for both of us."
The girl released herself and stood very straight. "What a terrible
thing to happen," she cried, referring to the hold-up rather than to
Mr. Pearson's floundering declaration. "Come, we must go home at
once."
They did. Pearson and the girl swinging on in front and two of their
rescuers bringing up the rear.
One of the latter nudged his friend. "Blamed if I didn't forget all
about the girl," he said.
The other shrugged his shoulders. "Can't take care of everybody in
the whole place, can we, eh?"
"I should say not," replied the first, "we ought to have six men to
take care of him alone. Blamed if I think three is enough for a
lively chap like him."
Miss Helen Ingraham and Mr. Oscar Pearson ascended the Inn steps side
by side. Miss Ingraham was hysterical. "I don't know what to tell
my mother," she exclaimed.
"Tell her the truth," said Pearson glibly, "tell her I proposed to
you and you accepted me."
"That is not the truth," replied Miss Ingraham, "and anyway I mean
about the accident--and where it happened--and why."
She told her, spent half the night telling her, in fact, conscious of
the terrible disapproval in her mother's eyes, but told her only
about the moonlight stroll and the attack.
"You had no right to leave the Inn," her mother said, "you know
nothing of this man, Pearson."
"Father does," replied the girl.
"Your father," went on her mother, "knows nothing about him, nobody
knows anything about him. I've asked everybody, sick as I've been--"
Suddenly she stopped. "Who were those three men who rescued you?"
she asked.
IV
That was the mystery that troubled Ravenswood from that time on.
Through all the subsequent excitement--for the hold-up made big
talk--that one feature over-shadowed all the others. It was a
pleasant diversion for Ravenswood to stop talking and to hold its
breath next morning as the tall and interesting Mr. Oscar Pearson
entered the dining-room and nodded to Miss Ingraham. Pleasanter
still, perhaps, for all Ravenswood to stand in line at the lock-up
and look upon the countenances of Mr. Cutty Wortman and Mr. Red
Cullen of New York. Pleasant to discuss the impending romance.
But--_who were the three men?_ In the day time they were but little
in evidence, they kept somehow out of sight; but at night denizens of
Ravenswood, grown accustomed to traveling in pairs, were startled now
and then by three skulking shadows--here, there, everywhere. And
these shadows meant one thing and only one; that somewhere near,
pacing the board walk or on the sand, gazing out to sea, there might
be found Mr. Oscar Pearson and Miss Ingraham.
"Swim to-morrow?" inquired he of her on the morning after. "The tide
will be about right for us at half past ten."
"Just as you say," she answered, "only my mother's case is getting
desperate. Even Dr. Crocheron admits his failure, and I've got to
spend most of my time with her."
Pearson smiled insinuatingly, "And if you didn't spend most of your
time with her," he asked, "who would you spend it with? I think," he
went on hastily, "that I'll have to bring down my Aunt Charlotte's
remedy from New York. Of course, I sympathize with your mother, but
it's mighty serious that most of your time is taken up with her.
That's the thing that Aunt Charlotte's cure has got to fix. Then
we'll see who takes up most of your time."
"Of course," she answered, "there's Dr. Crocheron. I don't mind
saying that I'm very fond of him--"
"You'll surely swim to-morrow?" he said.
"I promised you," she answered.
"All right," he said, "I'll bring my tires along." For by this time,
be it said, Pearson's luggage and his long, low racer had been
brought from Elsmere, his intended destination.
Next day they swam. Those were glorious days, as side by side, when
they tired of the long arm strokes, Pearson and the girl reclined on
the surface of the sea, each ensconced safely within the buoyant
circle of a Mastodon tire that rose and fell upon the waves like some
magic cockleshell.
"Rocked in the cradle of the deep," sang Pearson, in a baritone that
startled the crowd scattered in groups upon the beach. Side by side,
buoyed by the air inflated circles, they swam out--out--out,
forgetting everything save themselves and the magic of the sea.
Suddenly from the shore they heard hoarse shouts. It was then that
the girl lost her head. She glanced up to see the crowds waving, and
realizing for the first time that they were far out beyond the
hardiest swimmer--beyond the hardiest swimmer's distance. Someone on
shore had realized this and the shout invaded the girl with a sudden
sense of danger. All that she need do, in truth, was to lie still
and paddle back to shore as she had paddled out, but in her sudden
fright she slipped somehow out of her supporting tire and Pearson
caught her just as she disappeared beneath the waves.
"What's the matter," he cried sternly, "you're perfectly safe--you
can't sink--nothing can happen." But the girl was beside herself
with fright. She had lost confidence and her nerve had gone.
For answer she merely stretched forth two shapely arms and clung
tightly to the man's neck, sobbing hysterically.
Pearson, badly handicapped, could only thrust one arm through both
the tires and hang on. He could not swim, for her grip upon him was
too tight. All he could do was to support her and trust to luck that
she might regain her equilibrium. A forlorn hope, probably, and the
situation was one of real danger, for they were drifting out to sea.
The crowd on the shore were quite as helpless, all but three men.
Like parts of some machine, these three rose, dashed coats and shoes
to the ground, and swiftly ran out a canoe, head on across the
breakers. In less than ten minutes they had reached the pair and
checked their outward progress.
"Now," said one of the three, "climb in, while I hold her steady,
sir."
He was referring to the canoe, not to the girl. His two companions
each had a hand on Pearson, clutching him anxiously.
"Climb in, sir," they exclaimed.
"Climb in nothing," replied Pearson. "What about the girl."
"We'll take care of her, sir," they answered carelessly, "you climb
in."
Pearson laughed. "You're a great bunch," he said, glancing at them
quizzically, "who are you anyway?"
"Lifesavers, sir," they answered, without knowing just what else to
say.
Pearson grunted. "Women and children last, eh," he went on, "so
that's the lifesavers' code. Steady now, lift her in carefully. Now
I can swim to shore." He did, but they stood carefully by, making
sure he was safe. Twice, in their eagerness for him, they nearly
tipped over the canoe, but finally the brave little craft rose
bravely on top of a breaker, and before they knew it, they were all
upon the beach, and another page of Ravenswood romances had been
turned. Another link in the golden chain that the little cupids were
making, had been forged, and once more the mysterious triumvirate had
come to the front.
"Plays her cards mighty well anyhow," whispered the eighteen year old
wiseacres at the Inn, as the girl and Pearson drove back in his car,
after this episode.
"Who is he anyway?" asked one of them.
"Nobody knows," replied the other. And therein, like Mrs. Ingraham,
they spoke the truth.
Once more that estimable lady found herself under the necessity of
reproving her headstrong young daughter, but the girl suddenly and
unaccountably was defiant.
"Mother," she said, in a tone of voice that was new and unaccustomed,
"don't you think that perhaps I am the best judge of my actions,
after all?"
"Leave the girl alone," Ingraham, the banker, said to his wife that
night. "She's not going to marry this young chap, and from the
conversation I've had with him, he knows New York banks from A to Z.
I've got to get a line of credit, and I've got to get it right away,
my dear, or there's going to be trouble out in Cleveland. This chap
can give me pointers, and I need pointers just now, as badly as our
bank needs money." He slumped down into a chair and wiped his brow.
"My, but I'm tired," he said, "I've been all over New York to get
what I want. I've tackled every big bank but the Tri-State Trust,
and to-morrow I'm going to tackle that."
The next day he left the Inn at eight a.m. just as Pearson, in his
low racer, pulled out of the garage.
"Hold on there," cried Pearson, "don't take that stage. Where are
you bound for, Mr. Ingraham?"
"New York," said Ingraham, "where are you?"
"I'll take you up," replied the younger man, "I'm going to make a
flying trip myself."
That afternoon, Ingraham, the banker, more fatigued than ever, strode
into his wife's room at the Inn.
"By George," he said, "I couldn't see anybody at the Tri-State Trust.
They're all upside down there, probably due to this confounded thief
of a teller that robbed them. Everybody tells you that the Tri-State
Trust is as sound as a dollar, but it acts like a chicken with its
head cut off. Couldn't get hold of anybody that could do me any good
and--" He stopped suddenly. "What's the matter," he exclaimed.
Grouped around a couch were two figures, a man and a woman. The man
was Crocheron, M.D., and the woman was the banker's daughter Helen.
Propped up with many pillows was the banker's wife, wheezing her very
worst.
"Father," said Helen, "I think we'll have to go back to Cleveland at
once, mother has never been as bad as this, have you, mother?"
Her mother admitted it between gasps, and also asserted without
hesitation that Dr. Crocheron had seemingly fallen far short of
success.
Crocheron was wringing his hands. "I don't know what more I can do
for you, Mrs. Ingraham." he said, "I've applied all the known
remedies, and you know this is a thing that can't be cured and must
be endured."
Helen Ingraham held up her hand. "Wait a minute," she exclaimed,
"somebody told me of a remedy, a real remedy. I think we ought to
try it."
"Who told you?" inquired Crocheron.
"Mr. Pearson," she faltered.
"That's the first time I ever knew he was a specialist," exclaimed
the doctor.
"Pearson," echoed her father, "why, he's in New York, he took me up
this morning in his car, left me at the corner of Wall Street and
Broadway, and went up town. Maybe he's gone for good."
"No, he hasn't," returned his daughter, with an air of very positive
assurance.
For an instant the sufferer on the couch forgot her asthma. "How do
you know, my dear?" she asked her daughter.
Her daughter did not reply, for at that instant there was a knock
upon the door. Ingraham stepped to the door, opened it, held a
whispered consultation, and then came back into the room. "It's the
man we were talking about," he said, "and he wants to talk to you."
"To me?" asked Helen.
"No," returned her father, "to your mother. Wants to see her right
away."
Helen's face flushed. "Perhaps," she suddenly exclaimed, "he's got
Aunt Charlotte's cure."
"Aunt Charlotte," exclaimed her mother, "you have no Aunt Charlotte."
"This is his Aunt Charlotte," corrected, the girl, "not mine."
Ingraham once more opened the door and Pearson entered. He was still
pale, though the sun had made some inroads on his pallor. He still
had that air of weariness. He strode to the bedside. "Mrs.
Ingraham," he said, "I've brought you something that will cure you,
if you'll consent to try it."
Dr. Crocheron frowned with professional disdain. "What new remedy is
this, Mr. Pearson?" he inquired.
"That," returned the young man, "is something I shall divulge only to
Mrs. Ingraham. May I see her alone?"
"Certainly," said Mrs. Ingraham, who was willing to submit to any
experiment, to go through anything to relieve her suffering.
"Certainly," echoed Helen.
The doctor and the banker looked at each other in amazement, but
Pearson with a considerable display of executive ability and
self-possession, stood at the door and politely bowed everybody out.
Then he locked the door, took a small packet from his breast pocket,
and sat down by the bedside.
"Mrs. Ingraham," he began, "my Aunt Charlotte--"
Fifteen minutes later a young man stepped into the center of a small
group of people clustered upon one of the many balconies' that clung
to the Inn. "She's very much better," he announced smilingly.
Helen pressed forward and touched his arm. "Did she take the
remedy?" she asked.
He nodded. "She did," he answered, "though I'm convinced that it
shocked her sense of the proprieties to a great extent."
"What the dickens did you give her?" queried Crocheron.
"That," said Pearson, "as I've already indicated, is her secret, and
it shall be mine."
These four people sitting in the balcony did not observe three men,
who casually strolled up and down in front of the Inn, nor did they
observe that these three men stopped short, and that one of them
pointed somewhat unconventionally toward a wide window of the Inn
that faced the ocean.
"Jerusalem," said one of these three men to his two companions, "look
at the old lady in that window. She certainly has all the earmarks
of a dead game sport."
"That's a queer note," said the other. "I always thought she was a
staid old proposition. She's the wife of that banker from the West."
"Well," said the third, "she certainly doesn't look like a staid old
proposition now."
The three passed on, and Mrs. Ingraham, totally unconscious of their
observation, but fully conscious that for the first time in many
years she had become wholly comfortable, sat complacently in the open
window and smoked one of Aunt Charlotte's long black medicinal cigars
with the utmost nonchalance of manner.
V
"I tell you, the man's a thief." Ingraham, the Cleveland banker,
strode nervously up and down the big rooms that composed his suite at
the Ravenswood Inn. Before him, hanging on his words, sat his wife,
still puffing on her fireside companion, one of Aunt Charlotte's
Perfectos. His daughter Helen sat at a broad window gazing out at
sea.
"A thief," echoed Mrs. Ingraham, "it can't be possible."
"I tell you it's true," went on the banker. "Haven't I been in his
rooms dozens of times, smoking his cigars, drinking his old port and
telling him stories; and haven't I seen that tell-tale Gladstone bag
with the letters 'O.P.' painted on it; and yet, by George, he fooled
me, even me. It never struck me until to-day that the man was an
impostor, that he's a masquerader, and it's as clear as daylight now.
This chap Pearson is the thieving teller of the Tri-State Trust."
He turned suddenly. Helen was coming toward him with blazing eyes.
"That isn't true," she said in a low voice, and yet some unusual
confusion seemed to rest upon her. "It can't be true."
The old man stalked to a big closet in the room, threw open the door
and pointed to a top shelf. "Your mother," he went on, "keeps every
newspaper that she lays her hands upon. There's the bunch up there,
every one of them since we landed here."
He disappeared into the closet and a grunt or two indicated some
unusual exertion on his part. He came back in a moment, bearing a
pile of newspapers a foot in height, and tossed them on the bed.
Then he shook his finger at them. "Those sheets there," he
exclaimed, his face reddening as he went on, "they will tell
you--read them again. They'll show you that the very day this fellow
came here--that that very day he got out of the Tombs--was let out on
bail. Why was he so pale? What was the matter with him? Six weeks'
confinement in the cooler, that's what's the matter with him. Follow
the story down. You remember his going to New York a week ago with
me, what did he go for?"
For answer his asthmatic wife held up her black cigars. "For these,"
she gasped gratefully.
"Not a bit of it," answered her husband. "Read your newspaper. He
went up to plead to another indictment they had found against him;
you can't tell me. Take an hour off and go through that bundle on
the bed and you'll find that the Tri-State teller and this man
Pearson are identical. I tell you," he repeated, "he's a thief."
"But his money," exclaimed the banker's wife. "He's made of money."
"Made of money," snorted the Cleveland banker, "of course he is.
Didn't he get away with hundreds of thousands."
"But they wouldn't let him keep it," she returned.
"Wouldn't let him keep it," he repeated, "of course they wouldn't if
they knew where he kept it, but in order to get it they've got to sue
him and get a judgment--they've got to issue execution and they've
got to find out where it is. That fellow only had to put up fifty
thousand cash on the first indictment. They were afraid to let the
public know that he had gotten away with more. Only fifty thousand
out of all that cash, and he's got the rest except what that woman
took away from him."
Helen Ingraham turned pale, but her eyes still flashed. "It's not
true," she said, but her tone exhibited more hesitation than
indignation this time.
"And there's his automobile, his racer, there's property that they
can take," exclaimed Mrs. Ingraham. "Why don't they take that?"
"Ha," returned her husband, "he's probably got it in his wife's name,
that's the reason. He's probably got everything fixed so that they
can't get at it."
"His wife," echoed Helen stammering. "Has he got a wife?"
"I should think he had," retorted Ingraham. "Why don't you read the
papers."
Helen drew herself up. For an instant she threw all uncertainty from
her. "Father," she exclaimed, "you are totally mistaken. You don't
know this man: if you really knew him you would understand that he is
incapable of being a thief, incapable of anything that you have
charged against him."
Ingraham smiled a supercilious smile. He knew that he could shatter
all their doubts at one stroke and he had reserved this stroke until
the last. His forefinger shot out toward his daughter as though to
pin her with the force of his argument. "The old man's wrong, eh?"
he demanded. "Well, then, just explain one thing to me, what in
thunder do these three men mean, who follow him? Tell me that."
The stroke was an effective one. The argument was absolutely
unanswerable. Helen sank into a seat at the window, her lips closed,
her hands clasped, thinking.
Mrs. Ingraham, wheezing a bit at this startling conclusion, only
puffed the harder on her cigar.
"These three men," went on Ingraham, "mean this and only this, that
the District Attorney of New York County is not going to let this
chap, who has put up less than one-third of what he stole as bail,
get out of his clutches."
Mrs. Ingraham regained her composure. "Maybe he stole these
antiseptic cigars," she cried. And added "I only hope he'll steal
some more."
Ingraham stood over Helen. "Helen," he said, "you've been having a
good deal to do with this chap. You've taken a long chance, even if
he were the best instead of the worst. Now, you know he's the
worst--you know all he's done, and from henceforth I want you to
leave him severely alone. Though I'm sure," he added with a bow,
"that I don't have to tell you that."
Helen didn't answer. She didn't change her position at the window,
but her mother waved her hand excitedly to attract attention.
"Helen," she spluttered, coughing, "don't say anything to offend the
man until he steals some more of these cigars."
Helen did not answer her father's seriousness nor her mother's
gayety. She rose and swept swiftly from this room into another,
closed the door, locked it, and sat down alone.
"Confounded shame," said Ingraham to his wife, "that fellow made a
deep impression on the girl. I don't blame her, for he's made a deep
impression upon me."
His wife blew smoke rings. "And on me," she added.
"However," sighed Ingraham, "she'll do as we say--she'll leave him
alone; she'll cast him off before these people find out who he is.
Let's hope they'll never find out."
Helen started in bravely to leave Pearson alone. Her first step
toward it was to indite a brief note to him and send it nis office,
requesting an interview that night.
Singularly enough, Pearson had done the same by her, and the two,
each in solitude, read and somehow gloated over these summons to a
tryst. But Pearson little knew what was in store for him.
Hours later, the girl sat upon a little hillock of dry sand,
listening to waves that she could barely see, for the night was dark
Pearson fumed and fretted at her side.
"What's the trouble with me," he exclaimed insistently. "Don't you
know that that one moment at the railway station made you as surely
mine as I am yours? Doesn't your inner consciousness tell you that?"
"It does not," replied the girl coldly. Suddenly she turned to him.
"Tell me one thing, Mr. Pearson," she exclaimed, in a cruel, hard,
uncompromising voice, "have you told me the whole truth about this?"
Pearson laughed. "No," he answered, "why should I do that. How can
it signify. I wanted to know that you wanted me for myself--for the
man that I am, if I'm any kind of a man at all. I didn't want to
tell you the truth until after we had settled that."
"Have you nothing to tell me?" she inquired, her voice growing harder
still as she proceeded.
Her belligerent manner affected him unpleasantly. Her coolness froze
him. Under other circumstances he might have made a clean breast of
everything, but something combative within him kept him from it. He
thought for a moment and then he answered her.
"I've just one thing to tell you," he replied. "My name is not
Oscar, thank Heavens, and my name is not Pearson, ditto. My name,"
he added in a low voice, "is Ordway Pelletier."
The name evidently signified nothing to the girl, and apparently he
hoped it would not, for she sat silent--listless, even dejected, by
his side.
Suddenly he seized her hand, but she drew it from him.
"Why?" he demanded. Then like a flash he had caught it and was
holding it, staring down at it in blank surprise. It was her left
hand and upon her third finger was a gem that gathered from the night
all the night's darkness and turned it into brilliant rays of light.
It was a solitaire diamond ring that he stared at for so long.
"This was not here yesterday--last week," he exclaimed.
"No," she replied, "it was not."
"Then," he returned, "there's somebody else."
She did not answer.
"Somebody else here in Ravenswood," he went on.
She still was silent.
"It's Dr. Crocheron," he exclaimed now, with tones of disgust,
"Crocheron, that piffling proposition of a doctor--the village
cut-up. What in Heaven's name can you see in him?"
For answer the girl stared into the darkness. For a long time they
sat thus after he had released that hand of hers, with its portentous
token. Finally he rose.
"Is that all you've got to say to me?" he asked.
"That is all," she answered.
She too, rose, and left him, a white figure against the blackness of
the night. She swept on straight to the Inn, avoided all the
loungers of both sexes on the broad veranda, sped swiftly to her room
and locked herself in. Her first act upon switching on the light was
to jerk from that third finger the sparkling gem and to cast it into
a jewel box on her dressing-table.
"He thought," she said softly to herself, "that it was what it seemed
to be. It was the best way after all--the best way out of it." She
drew her hand across her eyes. "Ordway Pelletier," she whispered
softly to herself, "somehow I can't believe that you are what they
say you are, and yet--" Suddenly she switched off the light and
threw herself face down sobbing upon her bed.
VI
"Straight road down the beach?" asked Pearson.
"Sure," answered the attendant at the Inn garage, "twenty miles,
maybe, straight as you can go."
"Jove," answered Pearson, "just what I need. It's the only thing
that will brace me up. Where's my man?"
His man was sent for and he came. "Henri," said Pearson, "I want you
to put my racer in A No. 1 condition, and have it ready for me at
three o'clock."
"To-morrow afternoon?" inquired Henri indolently.
"Not a bit of it," replied his employer, "three o'clock this morning.
The moon will be up and I'm going to do something that I've never
done before."
"Yes, sir," said Henri, "and what may that be, sir?"
Pearson drew a long breath. "I'm going to beat the world's record in
a twenty-mile dash on the Shore Road, and I'm going to do it all
alone. Three o'clock, Henri, to the minute."
Henri nodded, and retiring to the recess where the racer stood,
switched on a dozen lights and started in to work.
Pearson gritting his teeth, digging his nails into the palms of his
hands, went back to the beach to sit alone upon that little hillock
of sand, to stare blankly for hours into the blackest of black nights.
No sooner had he left the Inn garage than Henri whistled to the
uniformed attendant. "Say," he whispered in a hoarse voice, "you go
an' tell one of them guys that is watching us, what you heard him
tell me, do you understand?"
"Who are them guys?" asked the other man. "I see them
here--there--everywhere. What are they watching for?"
"Search me," answered Henri, "all you got to do is to go and tell one
of them, do you understand?"
"What will they do," demanded the attendant, "stop him?"
"Search me," replied Henri, lighting up a cigarette, "that's their
business, not mine."
The attendant obeyed his orders, and Henri finishing his cigarette
and tossing it into the safety of the night, started in on his
allotted task.
In a half hour the three men he had sent for entered the garage.
"Anybody got a fast machine here?" one of them inquired.
The attendant, who had returned with them, nodded. "Mr. Pearson," he
returned.
"I know," said one of the three, "but I mean anybody else."
The attendant looked around the place, and finally placed his hand
upon a big machine. "This is the next fastest, gentlemen," he said.
"Who does it belong to?" demanded they.
"Mr. Ingraham, of the Inn," returned he of the garage.
The three put their heads together. "Well," they finally decided,
"we'll have to see Ingraham, that's all." So they saw Ingraham and
offered him a price to take out the car, and Ingraham, being a
practical man of the world, and being also curious as to their
mission, accepted their proposition and sent for his chauffeur. "And
I guess," said Ingraham to himself, "that I'll just hang around
to-night and see what's going on; there's something in the air." He
hung round on the grill side of the veranda, drinking Scotches, and
he was right about something being in the air, but that something did
not eventuate until the moon had peeped up above the horizon--until
the Cathedral clock inside was striking three.
Shortly after that the folding doors of the silent garage opened and
a long low racer, like some midnight marauding rat, thrust its nose
into the dispelling gloom, gave one or two squeaks of caution,
grunted a snort of defiance, and then silently darted past him, swung
into the Shore Road, and disappeared into the distance. He had only
time to note that the racer bore but a single figure, and that that
figure was Pearson. He waited then for a few minutes and waited not
in vain. Silently, his own ponderous steel-blue sixty horse power,
leaped in sight, François at the helm and the three mysteries as
passengers. That, too, darted past him and that, too, swung into the
Shore Road after the racer, like some huge rat terrier on the scent
of some huge rat.
"I'll bet dollars to doughnuts," exclaimed Ingraham to himself, "that
he's bound for Florida." And Ingraham went to bed.
It was at four o'clock in the morning that the night clerk
downstairs, drowsily nodding in the midst of his long vigil, was
aware that the night bell was insistently ringing. He rose, and
opened the door. Before him stood Dr. Crocheron.
"What's up, Doc," he demanded, "somebody 'phone you?"
"Nobody from here," answered Crocheron, "but they 'phoned me down the
line to come right over here and stay here until I was wanted.
What's up?" he asked.
"Blest if I know," said the clerk, "I haven't heard anything."
"Something must be doing," exclaimed the doctor, "I wonder what it
is."
He did not wonder long, for at that instant the toot-toot of a motor
car was heard in the distance, and before they knew it Ingraham's big
sixty horse power had pulled up under the _porte-cochère_ and three
men were lifting a heavy object out of the machine.
Crocheron peered at them across the broad veranda. "What's the
matter," he exclaimed.
"Matter enough," answered the three men in fearful tones, "smash up,
man killed, and a ten thousand dollar racer gone to the junk heap."
They swung their burden into the full light of the hotel office.
"Dead?" asked Crocheron.
"No," they whispered, "but mighty near it, that's why we sent for
you." They halted with Pearson's limp form between them and nodded
to the clerk. "Can you give us a ground floor room?" they asked.
"Sure," replied the clerk. He darted across the broad hall and threw
open the Governor's suite and ushered them in there. "Put him on
that bed," he said.
Once they had deposited their unconscious burden on the couch
reserved for high officials of the state, the three men fell back and
permitted Crocheron to examine him.
"Jove, but he's smashed up," said Crocheron, going over the man
carefully. He glanced at them interrogatively. "What was he trying
to do?" he asked.
"Nobody knows," they answered, "only he went past the lighthouse at
Shore Front faster than a streak of greased lightning. The night
watch saw him pass--he was going like mad--machine swung from side to
side--seemed almost beyond control."
At this juncture, Henri, who had been attracted by the hubbub, thrust
his countenance into the room. He wrung his hands in despair. "I
don't wonder, gents," he said, "I knew he'd get his, some time or
other, and he did it once too often.
"Has he done it before?" asked Crocheron.
"Sure," answered Henri. "Any time anything gets on his nerves, so he
can't stand it, he goes out and breaks the speed laws. Another man
would take to drink, he takes to this."
Crocheron sighed. "I don't know whether he'll take to any others,"
he returned. Then swiftly while he stripped his patient, he gave
brief directions in his professional low voice, directions for drugs,
splints, bandages, for surgical aid, for everything that occurred to
him, and not once during all this time did his patient regain
consciousness.
The three men stood about the couch, looking each other in the eye.
"It wasn't our fault," they assured each other, as though afraid of
some rebuke that waited for them in the future. "How could we have
helped it?"
VII
It was two days later. Ingraham, the banker of Cleveland, had sent
word to the New York specialist, who was waiting to see him, that he
would be glad to consent to an interview.
The specialist--and this specialist was the same man Pearson himself
had interviewed on the day he stepped out of the Tombs--came to the
point at once.
"Mr. Ingraham," he said, "this is a matter of life and death, and you
won't lift your finger to save a life."
"I won't do the thing you want me to do," returned the banker, "and I
don't see how it's going to save his life."
"Mr. Ingraham," went on the specialist, "this man's broken bones
don't cut any figure in his present condition. If it were only
broken bones, we could pull him through. It's a question of nerves,
shattered nerves, sir, and ever since that man recovered
consciousness, he's been calling for your daughter Helen. Sir, I'll
pit my knowledge against that of any expert in the world, and I say
to you that the presence of your daughter in that room is going to
save this man. Her absence is going to kill him."
"It will have to kill him, then," remarked the Cleveland banker.
In desperation the specialist left the room, and Helen, pushing open
her own door, entered it. "Father," she exclaimed, "I heard what he
said, and I know--I believe he speaks the truth. I'm going--going
down."
Ingraham gripped her wrist as in a vise and forced her into a chair.
"You'll do just what I say," he exclaimed. "I'm not going to have
your name in the papers, the talk of all New York, linked with the
name of this thief downstairs. You'll do just as I say, if you don't
I'll lock you up--do you understand?"
Helen understood. She leaned over, burying her face in her hands and
wept as though her heart would break.
Downstairs the specialist was 'phoning to New York. He was talking
to somebody in the Wall Street district. "You had better come down
here at once," he warned the man at the New York end of the wire,
"and knock something into this fellow's head, I can't."
Two hours later a natty looking individual was ushered into
Ingraham's apartment. "Mr. Ingraham," he said, "I'm the
representative of the International Insurance Company of New York.
We've got a branch in Cleveland."
"So you have," exclaimed Ingraham, passing his cigars, "and your
Cleveland branch banks at my bank."
"Exactly," replied the natty individual, "and it keeps large sums of
money on deposit there."
"Best customer I've got," murmured Ingraham gratefully.
The manner of the natty individual changed at once. "Mr. Ingraham,"
he exclaimed ferociously, "you don't want to lose your best customer,
do you?"
"No," returned Ingraham, paling.
"Well, you will," thundered this individual, "if you don't do what we
say."
"Wh--what do you say?" stammered Ingraham.
The stranger tapped Ingraham upon the shoulder. "You follow the
directions of our friend, the specialist, downstairs, friend
Ingraham," he remarked ominously. "Do everything he says, and we'll
stick to you. Decline, and you don't get a dollar of our money on
deposit. Do you understand?"
Ingraham, terribly agitated, threw open Helen's door, and called to
her. "Helen, my dear," he cried, "Helen, you must come with me."
Twenty minutes later Ingraham was standing outside of the Governor's
suite of rooms on the ground floor of the Inn. Inside, as he knew,
were Crocheron and the New York specialist--and his own daughter
Helen. From time to time, reports of the injured man's condition
filtered through the doors and were gobbled up by the groups of
guests who ranged themselves about the entries to hear every bit of
news.
Finally the specialist hustled out. He caught Ingraham by the lapel
of his coat. He seemed to have forgotten his resentment toward that
gentleman. "Mr. Ingraham," he exclaimed, "I've never seen anything
like it in all my experience. Talk about mental suggestion,
telepathy, or influence of one mind upon another. The instant that
your daughter entered that room, my man knew it without opening his
eyes. 'There she is,' he said, as she came in. These were the first
words he uttered, other than the constant calling of her name.
'There she is,' he said and opened his eyes and held out his
hand--his right arm, you know, is not broken--and then, Mr. Ingraham,
as your daughter stopped a minute and said, 'Mr. Pelletier,' he
smiled, actually smiled, sir, and he said, 'Can't you do better than
that?' and from the minute, Mr. Ingraham, that that girl uttered his
first name 'Ordway'--from that instant this young man's recovery has
been a fact assured."
The doctor beckoned to him the natty individual from the
International Insurance Company, and clutching him with his left
hand, while he held Ingraham with his right, he retold the tale with
gusto. "Most remarkable thing in my experience," he commented.
While they were standing there, two people approached them. Two
strangers they were. One was a woman in a long cloak with a veil
about her face, and the other was a youthful business man. The woman
started for the door and had her hand on the knob before she was
detained. She whispered some words to the man at the door and he
nodded toward the specialist. "You'll have to see him," said the
man. She swept toward the specialist and caught him by the arm.
"I must see him," she demanded.
"You can't," returned the specialist.
"I must," she answered, "it may be a matter of life and death; I
always have a wonderful effect upon him when he is ill, I don't know
why, but you must let me see him."
She pressed her card upon the specialist and he looked at it, though
it meant nothing to him, and under the force of her insistence, he
found himself entering the apartments with her. Once inside, he
found her not at all amenable to reason; she simply swept past him as
one who could not be stayed, and burst into the room where lay the
injured man, and then she stopped. And at the same instant she
stopped, the heart of Helen Ingraham seemed to stop beating, too, for
Helen noted that the injured man had turned to this woman with a new
light of something more than recognition in his eyes, and with a
clutch of fear upon her, she saw this other woman stride to the other
side of the bed, near Dr. Crocheron, and kneel down.
Crocheron tried to restrain her. "Who are you, madam," he exclaimed,
"his wife, or--what are you doing here?"
"She is neither," answered the patient, feebly, "she is only my Aunt
Charlotte. Let her stay."
Outside the door the youthful looking business man was arguing with
the representative of the International Insurance Company. "Do you
mean to tell me," he demanded, "that I can't see Mr. Pelletier.
Nonsense. I've got to see him."
"I'm on guard here," returned the insurance man, "and I'll see to it
that you don't see him. He's seen enough already."
"But this is a matter of life and death," pleaded the other. "I must
see him and he must see me. If he knew I was here he would insist
upon it."
The insurance man wavered. He felt after all, perhaps, that he was
not authorized to interfere quite as fully as he started out to do,
so by way of compromise he nodded and said: "Suppose you tell me your
business, if it's important, and I'll take the message to him."
The youthful business man looked about him, looked at Ingraham and
concluded, evidently, that he was to be trusted, although a stranger,
and then he went on to tell his troubles.
"We're all higgledy-piggledy up in the Tri-State Trust without
Pelletier," he said.
Ingraham interrupted him. "Pelletier," exclaimed Ingraham, "I've
heard that name somewhere. Who's Pelletier?"
"The man inside," returned the insurance man, jerking his thumb over
his shoulder.
But the other man went on. "You tell Mr. Pelletier," he said, "that
we won't bother him except about one thing. There's a cheap skate
banker over in Cleveland, of the name of Ingraham, who wants a line
of credit at our bank, and we've put him off and put him off until we
can't put him off any longer. Ask him what we'll do."
Ingraham turned scarlet. "Cheap skate banker," he exclaimed, "do you
know who you're talking about--do you know who you're talking to?
I'm Ingraham."
The other man was not even feezed. "Glad to meet you, Mr. Ingraham,"
he remarked, "even if you are a cheap skate banker." He held out his
hand. Ingraham ignored it.
"We don't let paying tellers like our friend inside," he thundered,
"loot our banks out in Cleveland, I can tell you. You New York chaps
have hayseed in your hair."
For answer the other stepped to the door and said a few words to the
doorkeeper, and finally was admitted.
The insurance man smiled mysteriously at Ingraham. "You don't
imagine, sir," he asked, "that Mr. Pelletier is an absconding paying
teller, do you?"
"I know he is," returned the banker. "I've followed that paying
teller's crime all through the papers, and this man's history has all
the earmarks of it. He's a thief."
The insurance man held up his hands. "Dear me," he exclaimed, "a
thief!"
At that instant the specialist returned and joined the little group
of two. The insurance man nodded to the specialist.
"Doctor," he laughed, "Mr. Ingraham here thinks that Pelletier is the
paying teller of his own bank."
"Why, my dear sir," interposed the specialist, "Pelletier is a
millionaire--he's the president of the Tri-State Trust--he's the man
whose dress suit case that paying teller stole when he stole the
funds, and this man Pelletier, overworked as he is anyway, worried
himself almost to death about the thing."
"Not about the dress suit case?" asked Ingraham.
"No," replied the insurance man, taking up the doctor's story, "but
because of this: he, the president of the Trust Company, was the only
official in the bank at the time when the paying teller stole the
money. The paying teller did it right under his nose, and for that
reason Pelletier felt responsible in the same degree as he would have
held a watchman responsible for letting a burglar get away. It
worried him to death."
"I should think it did," said the doctor, taking up the story, "and
after that Pelletier spent most of his time in the District
Attorney's office trying to get him to refuse bail, and up at the
Tombs trying to worm out of that paying teller the secret of his
hiding place where he had stowed away the loot. Pelletier told me,
in fact, that he thought he ought to pay back to the bank himself the
money that the paying teller robbed them of. Meantime, Pelletier's
nerves were going by the board. He had to get away from business--go
where business couldn't find him."
The insurance man shivered. "I should think so," he sighed, "with
business at his heels every minute of his time--he had to get away
incog."
Ingraham, his face flushed with these disclosures and with the
mistake of his own diagnosis, was silent for an instant. Then he
tightly clutched the doctor's arm.
"I think you're fooling me, gentlemen," he said slowly. "I think
this man is that paying teller, and you're merely friends of his,
trying to shield him. If I'm wrong, why is it that three New York
detectives follow this Pelletier about. Can you tell me that?"
The insurance man turned pale. "Did you know they were following him
about?" he asked.
The banker nodded. "Well, they didn't do their duty very well,
then," returned the representative of the International Insurance
Company. "Their instructions were never to show themselves, unless
necessary, and never to let Pelletier know that they were watching
him."
"It was necessary, several times, for them to show themselves down
here," burst in Ingraham, and he told about the incidents of the
hold-up and of the ocean rescue. "But," he persisted, "there's a
method in their madness that, I figure it, the District Attorney of
New York understands."
The insurance man hesitated for a moment, and then he looked Ingraham
in the eye.
"Mr. Ingraham," he exclaimed, "you're our banker out in Cleveland, I
suppose I may as well let you into the secret. The doctor here is
on. You didn't know that this young Pelletier is a crank on life
insurance. Millionaire as he is, he came to us for a Two Million
Five Hundred Thousand Dollar policy. After that, do you think we can
let him wander around alone, taking all kinds of risks? No, sir, we
can't even let him get sick safely. The International Life Insurance
has got to see that Ordway Pelletier lives out his three score years
and ten. Now, do you understand?"
Ingraham wilted. He understood, but he had no time to apologize, for
at that instant he felt a tug upon his coat sleeve, and his daughter
Helen drew him toward the door and into the room of the injured man.
"Father," she exclaimed, "if you want that line of credit in the
Tri-State Trust Company, you had better ask us now."
That evening as the dusk slowly settled down upon the Ravenswood Inn,
those who paced the board walk in the twilight, glanced from time to
time upward toward a moving spectacle. That moving spectacle
disported itself upon a balcony. It consisted of two elderly ladies,
apparently at peace with all the world.
Aunt Charlotte blew smoke rings into the heavens. "This is a lovely
spot," she murmured.
Mrs. Ingraham blew another set of smoke rings that rose and twisted
themselves about Aunt Charlotte's.
"Have you missed any of your cigars lately?" she inquired.
Aunt Charlotte lit a fresh one. "I should think I have," she
answered genially, her face widening to a broad but dignified grin,
"and Ordway has been filching them from me, the young thief."
Angelo
BY JOHN A. MOROSO
James Tierney pressed a pearl button on his desk in the handsome Wall
Street suite of James Tierney, Inc., and supplemented the electric
summons with a series of shouts for his first lieutenant, Mickey
Reilley.
Reilley bounced into his chief's office with a shameful apology for a
salute.
"Reilley," began the head of the famous private detective agency,
with the expression of a martyr on his clean shaven, homely
countenance, "y'gotta find me a Carrie again, a real nice Carrie, one
of those things with a little walking cane, a fried-egg hat, yellow
shoes and all the other frills."
Reilley looked his displeasure.
"Say," he asked, "what we runnin' now, a college annex?"
Tierney held before him a letter from one of his directors and
backers, a Broad Street banker who had gathered an almost criminal
share of the country's wealth.
"Yow! Wow!" he grunted as he studied the epistle. "Here's Mr. James
Frothingham Phillips, one of the guys what put us in business, asking
to have his daughter, Ione--get that name?--shadowed."
"What she doing, shoplifting?"
"Nix; making love to the family chauffeur."
Reilley dropped into a chair and put his head in his hands.
"Say," he groaned, "if they keep shootin' this kind of business at us
we'll get to be a set of nice old ladies, believe me. I t'ought we
was put here to look out f'r the banking business and watch the
yeggs."
Tierney looked at his aide with glassy eyes.
"We're here to do just what they tell us to do," he said. "If your
conscience hurts yuh, go up to police headquarters and work with the
bulls until you're cured and then come back f'r a job." He grinned
sarcastically.
"There's only one swell guy in reach," Reilley said, surrendering
promptly. "He's outside now smoking a perfumed cigarette and making
the office smell like--"
"Trot him in."
Reilley went to the waiting room and returned immediately with
William Winthrop, only that very morning rechristened "Boston Willie."
Willie nodded patronizingly to Tierney as he stood flickering at his
gray trousers with a silver-topped cane. He was a well set-up
youngster of twenty-five, with broad shoulders, bright, clear, blue
eyes, silky complexion and the hint of a smile playing about
patrician lips.
A gorgeous blue scarf relieved the neutral gray of his well made
morning suit. A black pearl set in carved gold for a stickpin was
his only ornament. His gloves were chamois and of such freshness
that it was evident that he was accustomed to having people open
doors.
"How-do, Mr. Tierney," he said in a Harvard drawl that would have
made an Eliot lecture sound like a Salvation Army appeal.
"How-do," repeated Tierney.
"It's--ah rawther a pleasant--ah morning."
"It's grand," said Tierney. "I gotta job f'r yuh."
"Thanks awf'ly, y'know, and all that sort of thing."
Tierney began to feel a pounding in his head. Reilley loomed in the
background, grinning fiendishly as he watched his chief suffer.
"D'yuh know a society girl named Ione Phillips?" he asked when he
felt that he could proceed without loss of reason.
"Ione Phillips?" repeated "Boston Willie." "I've heard the name.
Ah, yes! She was at the Pawmer cotillon last New Year's eve, I
believe."
"The Pawmer cotillon?" asked Tierney.
The young man nodded.
"The Pawmers, y'know," he explained.
"How do you spell them?"
"P-a-l-m-e-r-s."
"Oh, I gotcha, Steve," cried Tierney. "Yuh must excuse me, Mr.
Winthrop. I don't talk Boston very well."
Reilley left the room to avoid an explosion of mirth.
"What about the--ah, young lady?" Boston Willie asked.
"She's trying to get the family chauffeur to elope," explained
Tierney getting down to business. "She's the only daughter and her
paw wants her to marry a duke, or anyhow, nuthin' cheaper than a
count. He's got the price and if there was any kings in the discard
he'd spend a few millions and pick one up."
"Jove," exclaimed Willie, "I remember them now. She's the daughter
of Old Man Phillips."
"K'rect," said Tierney, "on her father's side and of Old Lady
Phillips on her mother's side."
The smile about Willie's lips broke into a series of wide-spreading
ripples and his eyes sparkled. "Ha!"
That one "ha" alone escaped his lips. It represented laughter.
Mirth had stirred him profoundly.
When he recovered from this outburst Willie placed a gloved hand to
his side as if it ached.
"My word, Mr. Tierney," he said, "you are droll."
Tierney looked at him suspiciously.
He made a mental note of that word "droll." He would look it up.
His stenographer had a dictionary.
"Anyhow, Mr. Winthrop," he said, "yuh gotta see that she don't elope
with the chauffeur. The gir-rl's paw writes me that he is a very
handsome chauffeur, but he is a wop."
"A wop," repeated Tierney. "Some people would call him a Guinea,
others might call him a Joe and I guess he calls himself an
Eyetalian."
"Oh!"
"My talk is the rough stuff, Mr. Winthrop, but I'm telling you what
yuh gotta do," went on Tierney, seriously now. "Don't let Ione marry
the wop. Marry her yourself if it is absolutely necessary--but use
that only as the last resort. You know you ain't no duke or even a
count. Her old man's got all the money that Rockefeller didn't have
time to pick up. Go out and hire the finest gazump that ever burned
benzine. Buy all the fine clothes and little hats that you want.
Blow yourself to more neckties and walking sticks. Do just as you
please. If I sent Ione's paw an expense bill under a thousand a week
he'd think I was loafing on the job and only a piker. Just see that
she don't marry the family chauffeur."
"Why don't Mr. Phillips fire the chauffeur?" asked Willie.
"Why?" repeated Tierney. "Because just as soon as he fired him she'd
run away and nothing could prevent her marrying the guy except sudden
death. She'd give up home and candy and everything else and start
life all over again in a hall bedroom with one gas jet and a frying
pan. She'd take in washing until her husband got another job.
That's the way they all do when the handsome chauffeur is fired."
CHAPTER II
"Angelo, you forgot the book of sonnets!"
Ione Phillips, half recumbent on the springy auto cushions, was
canopied by a low swinging bough of dogwood, heavy with snowy white
blossoms. At her feet rippled and purled a brook which the spring
freshets forced laughingly on its way to a river down in the valley.
The golden gleam of the dog's-tooth violets in the sward at either
hand made a rug such as even the hired connoisseurs of her
multi-millionaire father could not hope to spread upon his floors.
Anemones, in their soft, fawnlike coats, peeped toward her like so
many pretty nuns. Shyly they took glances at her abundant feminine
vigor and beauty.
"Si, signorina mia."
Angelo hurried back to the abandoned automobile in the road and
brought the sonnets.
He was twenty-three years old--the skidoo age, the fine time of youth
when mundane troubles are shed as easily as the rain from a well
thatched cottage. He was lithe of form, had a perfect nose and lips
shaped for kissing pretty girls. His brow was arched finely and his
hair was raven.
Angelo was from the Piemonte, that delectable province on the Swiss
border where the cool shadow of the Alps tries in vain to fathom
lakes as soft, as sweet and as deep as the eyes of women. It was in
this country, when she was on her way to Venice with her father, that
they met for the first time. Mr. Phillips wanted a chauffeur who
spoke Italian, French and English and Angelo fled his studies at the
University of Torino to take the job and be near her and within the
sound of her sweet voice.
"Did you bring the grammar book, too?" asked Ione.
"Si, signorina," he replied. "I bring eet sure."
Little patches of sunlight played about her, kissing her full lips,
the pink lobes of her shell-like ears, dancing in her golden tresses
and caressing her warm cheeks.
There was no sonnet in the book Shakespeare made that could approach
in delectability the loveliness before Angelo.
"Now for the lesson," she said, making room for him on the cushions.
He sighed and began with the same old verb, the same, sweet, old verb
which makes a tie that binds all young men and all young girls.
"Io amo," he began.
"Io amo," she repeated. "I love."
"Tu ami," he read.
"Tu ami--thou lovest," she echoed.
"Egli ami."
"Egli ami--he loves."
"Noi amiamo."
"Noi amiamo--we love."
Her hand touched his as she turned the leaf. He caught it and
crumpled it in his own.
"Signorina, signorina amatissima," he said. "I love you, I love you
so!"
She did not draw back from him or deny him the honey of her lips.
"Hello! Hello, people!"
It was as if all the first violins in the heavenly choir had popped
their strings at the same moment.
They turned, frightened, and beheld the face of a young man amid the
leaves of their trysting place.
"Beg pardon," said the intruder. "I saw a machine out in the road
and know someone would be near. I've lost my way, y'know. Could you
help a chap reach Edgewater?"
Ione's face was crimson.
"Why," she gasped, "you are Mr. Winthrop, are you not?"
Willie removed a bulgy cap.
"And you are Miss Phillips, I do declare," he said in feigned
surprise. "Do forgive me. Really, I'm much distressed and all that
sort of thing, what? Never dreamed for a moment it was your car in
the road. Quite--ah stupid of me, Miss Phillips. But you'll forgive
me, won't you?"
Angelo scrambled to his feet and began picking up cushions and books.
"We paused for a drink of water from the brook," Ione fibbed. "We
are returning by way of Edgewater. You may follow my car."
"So kind of you," said Willie. "Lovely day, isn't it?"
"Yes," she replied coldly.
Angelo lugged the books and the cushions to the car in menial fashion.
"How about riding back with me in my new car?" inquired Willie as
Ione reached the road. "It's a hummer."
"Thank you, but the road is new to my chauffeur and I must point out
the way for him," she replied. "We shall be coming back soon. The
ride along the Palisades is very beautiful in the spring-time."
Angelo had cranked up his machine with several vicious twists. She
took her seat behind him.
"Full speed, Angelo," she whispered.
"I like to break hees neck, bella mia," growled her lover.
"He ees no gentleman, maledetto sia!"
CHAPTER III
James Tierney, incorporated, was going through his mail, the only
task of the day he hated. He had passed through a half hour of agony
and little beads of perspiration spangled his brow when he picked up
a bulky letter in a monogrammed envelope. He opened it and spelled
it out slowly:
"NEW YORK, May 15, 1912.
James Tierney, Incorporated, Triple Syndicate Building:
My dear Mr. Tierney--As instructed, I make a report on the case of
Miss Ione Phillips. By your authority I have rented a
seventy-horsepower runabout--$300 a week. This includes garage and
supplies. I have also taken a small apartment in the Buxom Arms on
Fifth Avenue, near the Phillips home, $400 for the first month. For
wardrobe, living expenses and so on I have expended this week $260.
On last Wednesday I followed Miss Phillips in my car. The chauffeur
took her across the 129th street ferry to New Jersey. Near Clinton
Point on the Palisades the car was stopped and Miss Phillips and the
chauffeur left it. They made themselves comfortable beside a break
in a boscage--
Tierney pressed a button and shouted:
"Nellie! Nellie Regan!"
His stenographer dashed into the room, pad in hand.
"Bring the little book," shouted Tierney in agitation.
She rushed back to her desk and returned immediately with a cheap
edition of Webster's dictionary.
He pointed out the word "boscage" to her.
"Look it up quick," he ordered. "I dunno what it is but it sounds
fierce. Them two young people might be dead by now."
Miss Regan flipped the leaves of the book and finally read:
"Boscage, a wooded nook."
"Ah," sighed Tierney, "that'll do. I thought it was some sort of a
swamp." He continued reading the letter:
"While in this sylvan retreat the young people lost no time in
indulging in passionate osculation--"
"Woops, my dear!" shouted Tierney, pressing the button and yelling
for Nellie once more.
"Gimme that book again and beat it out of here," he ordered. "None
of this Eleanor Glyn stuff for you."
He delved into the volume.
"Osculation," he read, "kissing; close contact."
He threw the book into a far corner of the room, mopped his brow and
returned to the letter:
I interrupted them on the pretext of having lost my way and got them
started back to Manhattan. It is evident the chauffeur and Miss
Phillips are in love and expect to elope.
By careful inquiry I have learned that Angelo, the chauffeur, is a
skilled aviator and that he has a two passenger biplane in a big barn
over in Bergen county, New Jersey. Miss Phillips is enthusiastic
about flying. They may use the biplane for the elopement.
I ran down to Hempstead, Long Island, yesterday and bought the best
monoplane to be found in the hangars. It was a bargain, only $3,800.
It has high speed and a big fuel tank. It is warranted to fly 260
miles. I have had it shipped over to Jersey and placed in a barn
less than a quarter of a mile from Angelo's machine. Very sincerely,
WILLIAM WINTHROP.
P.S.--The Italian cruiser _Il Vincitore_ is due in the harbor the
first of next week. She is to take on several aviators and American
machines for use in the Turkish war. Angelo is very patriotic and he
may take a job killing Turks from the air. The cruiser has a deck
for launching and receiving air machines."
Tierney read the postcript a second time. "I got his number," he
said slowly. "I got it right in my back pocket. He is going to buy
a warship and charge it to Tierney."
He played a fandango on the row of buttons on his desk and called
aloud for Reilley. "Reilley," he said when his aide poked his head
in the door, "I want to ask yuh where yuh got that pretty little boy
yuh call Boston Willie?"
"Advertised f'r a college graduate," was Reilley's reply.
"Did he have any references?"
"A wagonload."
"Read 'em?"
"Naw."
"Bring 'em here and deal me about five. I wanta see how my luck is
running."
Reilley got the letters of recommendation and reference presented him
by Willie.
One was from a friend of Tierney in the United States Secret Service.
In effect it said that Willie was just out of college and was hunting
excitement. He had handled two cases for the government and had
handled them well. "He is afraid of nothing on earth or in the air,"
wrote Tierney's friend. "His only weak point is his disregard for
money. He spends freely."
"What got your goat, Jim!" asked Reilley.
"O, the Angora is all right now," sighed Tierney. "I thought I was
being bunked. I'm glad to hear he gets what he goes after. The only
thing to worry about is this one sentence, 'He spends freely.' Of
course Mr. Phillips is a rich man, but if I send him a bill for a new
navy to be used entirely by Willie he might peeve."
"A navy?" asked Reilley.
"Yes," replied Tierney. "He's got a seventy-horsepower car, a suite
of rooms on the Avener, an airship and, I'll bet, at least forty new
little hats and a hundred new little walking sticks. But I told him
to get what he wanted."
"But if he sidetracks the gir-rl into marrying a duke or a count it
will be all right, won't it, Jim?"
"It will, Mickey," Tierney replied, "but his first report is that
last Wednesday he finds the lovers osculatin' in a boskidge over in
Jersey."
"Cripes, that's somethin' fierce," said Reilley.
"Yes," mused his chief. "Willie has got to get busy pretty quick or
Old Man Phillips will find himself with a wop-in-law on his hands."
CHAPTER IV
West of the Palisades the Jersey country rises in slow undulations
like the swell after a storm in mid-ocean.
The village of Dumont is perched upon one of the highest of these
hills, the top of which is flattened into a well tilled plateau.
At full speed the Phillips' auto swept through the town of Tenafly
northward along the country road, took a cross road on the bias, tore
through the village of Cresskill and disappeared to the west where
the Dumont plateau spread level with the wooded tops of the distant
Palisades.
Behind it came a roaring cloud of dust and gasoline fumes. Boston
Willie clung to the wheel, steering the machine more by instinct and
faith in the luck of careless youth than by the use of his keen young
eyes, for his goggles were encrusted with oily earthflakes torn up by
the car ahead.
The two machines fairly leaped to the Dumont plateau. The Phillips'
car turned into the farm road of Peter Westervelt and the one behind
kept on its way to the farm of Guy Verdon, an ancient native with
broad acres and whiskers.
In two big barns a quarter mile apart Angelo and Willie got busy
twanging the fine wires that held widespreading wings to the hollow
steel piping frames of two air machines.
It was an early spring afternoon toward the time of the coming of
dusk and where the fields were not turned up by the husbandman they
showed goldenwide with dandelions and buttercups.
White clouds were piled in the eastern sky and a faint touch of gold
tipped the scrollery of their edges, for the sun was dipping toward
the western hills. The air was still save for the evening songs of
the robins.
In the Westervelt barn Angelo tied a bit of string about the nifty
walking skirt of Ione, hobbling her for safety's sake and not for
fashion's. She took her seat behind the little perch of the aviator
and Angelo wheeled the machine to a stretch of clover.
From the Verdon barn Willie Winthrop wheeled his monoplane to a
stretch of level which a farmer had cleared of every stick and stone.
Then Willie climbed to the hayloft and scanned the Westervelt field
through a pair of field glasses. He saw a rival biplane in position
and heard its exhaust snapping dully in the distance. He clambered
down the ladder and jumped into his seat in the monoplane.
"When'll ye be back, young man?" asked the old farmer.
"God knows," replied Willie. "This is--ah--only my second flight and
I have far to go."
"Don't be a danged fule now, son," said the Jerseyite kindly.
"Ha!" laughed Willie.
"Any of them flying men git killed down at the city to-day?" asked
Verdon.
"Not a one," replied Willie, scanning the heavens above the
Westervelt farm. "Four landed on the decks of the Italian warship
and are now safely stowed below."
The ruffle of propellers sounded across the fields and the biplane
with the elopers soared aloft.
Willie gave a warning, threw on his power, took firm hold of his
steering levers and was off in pursuit through the air.
Like two great dragonflies the air machines soared in a southeast
course. They crossed the Palisades and steered to the south above
the gleaming Hudson.
The biplane soared higher and higher in the air, Angelo knowing that
he would thus avoid the counter currents of air made by the
skyscrapers of downtown New York. Willie's monoplane, like a
swallow, soared in his wake.
The gold touching the clouds in the east had deepened to crimson.
The evening star was pallid in the skies and far over to the
northeast the lights of Coney, Brighton and Manhattan winked in the
sunset shadows beneath a crescent moon.
The Italian Cruiser _Il Vincitore_ had already drawn anchor and was
lying, with just enough steam in use to keep her motionless, at the
mouth of the Ambrose channel. She was ready to start under full
speed for the other side.
The biplane headed for it, dipped, made several wide circles and
landed lightly on the aeroplane deck where a swarm of sailors were
ready to catch it and hold it fast.
Three pillars of black smoke shot from the funnels of the war vessel
as she got under way, gathering a great bone in her teeth as her
speed increased.
Above and around her soared Boston Willie in his monoplane.
Thousands of commuters crowding the ferryboats watched, fascinated.
They could hear the hum of his propellers.
Nearer and nearer the winged thing circled to the cruiser. With a
last downward dip it swept around the fighting masts and then landed
on the deck of the speeding vessel.
"Good Lord; what a feat!" cried a harbor skipper. "That birdman must
be a lunatic!"
CHAPTER V
A short message from the Italian cruiser by wireless informed Banker
Phillips that his daughter was safe aboard her and married to Angelo,
the chauffeur.
The multi-millionaire went up into the air with a shriek of rage.
When he descended he clamored for secretaries, clerks and messengers
to get James Tierney, Incorporated, and bring him immediately to his
office. Whenever anything sensational happened among the heinously
rich, whether indictment or elopement, the heinously rich immediately
affected called in its own private police system.
Tierney was brought before the banker just as a smartly uniformed boy
brought in another marconigram.
Phillips tore it open and read:
On Board Cruiser _Il Vincitore_, Via Marconi.
J. F. Phillips, 40 Wall Street, New York.
Angelo is the Duke of Torrigiano. Is admiral of the air fleet. Got
marriage license in Hackensack. Married on board by ship's chaplain
to Ione. Ship inside of three mile limit off Jersey coast. Duchess
sends love and joins duke in asking blessings. WINTHROP.
In the directors' room adjoining the office of the banker a group of
financiers were waiting to conclude an important meeting that had
kept them downtown until after sunset.
Mr. Phillips let them wait and let Tierney stand nervously in fear of
his wrath as he read and re-read this message.
"Duchess sends love!"
How well it sounded! The cloud of wrath left his ruddy, round face
and he stroked his silvery siders with gathering complacency.
Another messenger entered the room. He bore a wireless for Mr.
Tierney, forwarded from his office.
The Incorporated One took it and opened it with trembling hands. It
read:
On Board Cruiser _Il Vincitore_, Via Marconi.
James Tierney, Triple Syndicate Bldg., New York.
Could not have stopped marriage without use of battleship. Followed
them to the altar in cabin of the commander. Duke is fine fellow.
Made me second in command of air fleet of Italian navy. Pay Guy
Verdon, Dumont, N. J., two thousand for burning his barn. Good-bye.
WINTHROP.
Tierney looked up from the slip of yellow paper. Mr. Phillips had
left his chair and was pacing his private office, his chest puffed
out and his fat hands clasped behind his back.
"Mr. White," he said in crisp businesslike tones, "take this message,
please."
His secretary was ready.
The Duke and Duchess of Torrigiano, Aboard his Italian Majesty's
Cruiser _Il Vincitore_, he dictated. Blessings on my children.
Cable arrival on other side. Will join you in three weeks at most,
FATHER.
He turned to Tierney after a word to his secretary, commending haste
in getting the wireless under way.
"There is nothing more to be done, Mr. Tierney," he said. "I thank
you very much for putting such an excellent man on an extremely
difficult and delicate matter. You might send him a bonus with my
compliments."
Tierney grinned feebly.
"Let me have your bill in the morning and I shall send you a check,"
added the banker.
Mr. Phillips opened the door to the directors' room.
"Gentlemen, I am very sorry to have kept you waiting," he said with
large apology, "but only a few moments ago I received the news that
my daughter Ione and the Duke of Torrigiano, one of the most
illustrious young noblemen of Italy were married to-day."
As he was receiving his congratulations, proudly Tierney left the
banking house and sought a long distance telephone.
He called up Guy Verdon in Dumont, Bergen county, New Jersey. He
informed the whiskered farmer that he had received a message from Mr.
Winthrop asking him to pay him for burning his barn.
"Yes; I burnt it," the voice of the Jerseyite squeaked over the wire.
"Is the young man safe?"
"He's safe," replied Tierney. "But what was the celebration about?"
"There warn't no celebration."
"Why did he order you to burn it, then?"
"Why," came the voice from distant Jersey with a little laugh
catching in the words, "he's a regular cut-up, that boy is. He
sailed away from here just before sundown an' he 'lowed it might be
night when he sailed back, if he sailed back at all. So he offers me
two thousand for the barn and tells me to light it off after real
dark set in, which I did the same. He said he would need a beacon to
guide him to his landing place. He's a nice young feller."
Tierney told him he would mail a check in the morning and hung up the
receiver. He took a roundabout way to his office, skirting the edge
of the financial district until he struck Rose Street. He crossed
under the third arch of old Brooklyn Bridge and came to the lowly
tavern of one John Murphy at the corner of Rose and Duane. Placing a
slippery nickel on Murphy's bar he asked for as large a portion of
beer as the money would pay for.
As he sipped from his schooner he muttered to himself:
"One seventy-horsepower car, one aeroplane, one swell flat on the
Avener, one large barn, a hundred little hats, two hundred little
walking-sticks, one boskidge in Joisey, some hot osculation and one
Jook!" He drank the last of the beer.
"But he's got brains, that kid," he added as he slammed through the
swinging doors. "He's got brains. If he'd queered that marriage I'd
have lost me jawb. Old Man Phillips has got his Jook and he got him
dirt cheap as prices go nowadays, believe me."
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