Past Masters Twenty-Four
Author: Various
Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Description: The 24th in a series of short story anthologies averaging around 100,000 words each. The stories are waifs and strays published in newspapers and magazines, but which have not been collected in print Author's own collections, nor in other anthologies; or have been, but those collections or anthologies are not in print. All are in the Life+70 Public Domain. As usual I have given the vital dates of the authors, and also the original magazine or newspaper source. 1: The Sovereign of the Sea / Albert Richard Wetjen 2: The Last Touches / Mrs. W. K. Clifford 3: The Mystery of Sasassa Valley / Arthur

PAST MASTERS

TWENTY-FOUR

April 2021

Part 2

Produced by Terry Walker

("Pulpmeister")

Contents

1: The Sovereign of the Sea / Albert Richard Wetjen

2: The Last Touches / Mrs. W. K. Clifford

3: The Mystery of Sasassa Valley / Arthur Conan Doyle

4: Ashes of Circumstance / J. U. Giesy

5: The Malignant Entity / Otis Adelbert Kline

6: The Demon of Tlaxpam / Otis Adelbert Kline

7: An Arc of Direction / Junius B. Smith

8: The Case of Minna Lang / Charles Michael Williams

9: The Strange Adventure of Tommy Lawn / Albert Richard Wetjen

10: Pod Flits / George Allan England

11: The Letter With The Black Seal / John K. Leys

12: Proof of the Pudding / Aidan De Brune

13: The Wedding Cake / Aidan De Brune

14: Wiles of  Cho Chun / Aidan De Brune

15: A Question of Coke / Aidan De Brune

16: The Elusive Mr Chon / Aidan de Brune

17: Spring is Here / Will Rogers

17: Monsieur De Guise / Perley Poore Sheehan

19: Demons of the Cold / Raymond S. Spears

20: The Queer Place / Frederick Niven

21: Signals of Storm / Raoul Whitfield

__________________

1: The Sovereign of the Sea

Albert Richard Wetjen

Collier’s 1 Sep 1928

Observer (Adelaide)  27 Oct 1928,

IT OFTEN happens that the most vital thing in a man's world is something he accepts so casually, so much as matter of course, that its importance escapes him. Capt. Graham had been going to sea some 30 year before the abrupt knowledge came to him that he served a master greater than his owners, greater than his ship, greater even than deep water itself. Indeed, all these others— owners, ship and deep water—in their turn served this master. Men signed away for some reason they considered good, for fame, money, love, bread, adventure. Such things were the stars that held them, to which they gave their youth, their manhood, often enough their lives. But after that one memorable voyage of the Carradine, Capt. Graham knew that ships and men and the sea were bent to one purpose, to one end, to the yoke and service of one silent and inexorable master before which duty, honour, love, toil, fame, adventure, life itself were as incense offered before some ancient and indifferent shrine.

The Carradine loaded lumber at Gray's Harbour for San Francisco and points south this particular voyage. For two weeks the winches rattled along her decks. Derricks swung, guys jarred, 6team hissed, men shouted. On the wharfs gangs laboured like beavers, piling the lumber in slings which the winches lifted and then lowered into the gaping holds, where other gangs received it. The Carradine's mates watched that the stowage was properly done, this size lumber placed so, that size placed otherwise. First into the ship must go the stuff consigned for San Diego. Above that the stuff consigned for San Pedro. And above that again the main cargo for San Francisco. This last overflowed from the holds, which already had two million feet, and another million was carefully stacked on deck and made fast with great chains.

In time the stevedores left the ship; the hatches were secured; the winches ceased their clamour; the derricks were lowered to the top of the deck load and made fast. The blue peter fluttered from the foremost halyards, and the Carradine was ready for the sea. The pilot came aboard. The lines were cast from the wharf bollards. The telegraphs clanged, and the vessel moved away. The next dawn found her lifting and falling across sullen leaden swells, her rigging wet and dripping from the rain that drove out of a sickly sky, and her whole lumber-gorged being shaken and creaking from the pounding of her engine. Capt. Graham, who had been up all night, took a last look around, crossed the bridge to peer into the compass, and then, with a word to his mate, went below. It was about that time things began to happen.

Capt. Graham was just finishing a belated breakfast in his cabin when the steward appeared.

"The second engineer, sir," said the steward, a trifle breathless. "He's broken his leg."

"Leg?" said Capt. Graham, bolting a last fragment of toast and rising to his feet. The steward nodded.

"He fell over the steam-pipe casing, sir. We took him to his room."

"Well, well!" jerked Capt. Graham. "I'll be right along."

The steward went away. Capt. Graham pulled on the jacket he had only recently taken off, adjusted his peaked cap and went amidships, a sturdy, brisk little man with graying hair, keen blue eyes and a pleasant, round red face. He bustled into the second engineer's cabin with a cheery, "Well, well!" and thereafter set the broken leg with quick, steady fingers, while he chatted amiably of one thing and the other, told a few stories, swore a bit when a safety pin pricked his thumb. When he left, the second engineer was lying contentedly on his back, his injured limb swathed in bandages, and, though his face was white and drawn, enjoying one of Capt. Graham's cigars.

The captain, returning to his cabin, prepared to get some sleep. He undressed without interruption, climbed into his bunk, and was just pulling the blankets up to his chin when the Carradine was shaken by a heavy crash. Some one shouted from aft. Shoes pounded along the deck. The second mate rapped on the captain's door, and then opened it to discover the master of the Carradine already getting dressed again.

"Yes?" said Capt. Graham; "What is it now?"

"Fall wire of the derrick the men were working with aft, sir," said the second mate. He removed his cap, came over the storm step and stood on the mat just inside the door. "Dropped the boom on those, drums of case oil we had lashed to the rail."

"Any one hurt?"

"No, sir."

The captain sighed and dismissed the second mate with a wave of his hand. He went aft to inspect the damage, gave a few orders to the mate, and then came midship again in time to stop a fight that was raging all over the galley between the chief steward and the third mate, while the cook, purple with rage at the desecration of his private shrine, hovered around, poising a heavy aluminum pot ready to take a crack at the first head which issued from the melee.

The captain burst on the scene with an outraged, "Well, well!" and matters were smoothed over. The chief steward went to his room. The third mate went to his. The cook calmed down and relieved himself by swearing at his assistant.

Capt. Graham thought he might try to sleep now. He was not particularly perturbed by what had happened.  Men will occasionally fall and break their legs; wire will give; and men will fight when their nerves are frayed with .too much tanglefoot after a last shore debauch. And then, too, there were voyages when everything seemed to go wrong at once. This, the captain decided, as he climbed to his bunk again, was just such a voyage. He sighed and closed his eyes, and even as he fell asleep he dimly heard four bells, 10 o'clock, strike from the wheelhouse above him.

It was about 11 o'clock when Capt. Graham, was jerked back to consciousness by the mate shaking him. He sat up in his bunk, blinked stupidly around, and then rubbed his face in his hands.

He heard the mate saying in a somewhat strained voice, "There's a fire somewhere down in No. 3, sir," and as the meaning of the words seeped into him he stiffened abruptly and then swung out of the bunk and. stood upright on the deck. He dressed quickly while the mate explained that he had seen smoke issuing from the port king-post just abaft the bridge, and, dropping down into the hole left in the deck lumber where No. 3 hatch was, he found smoke oozing from under the tarpaulin there.

"What's in No. 3?" demanded Capt. Graham. "Anything besides lumber?"

The mate thought for a moment, and then his face lightened.

"I had the galley coal put in the shelter deck, sir. It came aboard sacked, and we had about every place filled."

"Sacks wet. Combustion, I suppose," jerked the captain. He preceded the mate out on the bridge, took a long look at the king-post the mate indicated, and said, "Well, well!" quite briskly when he saw the telltale wisp of vapour linger for a moment in the rain and then vanish.

First they lashed canvas round the top of the king-post, which was hollow, and, besides acting as a mast for a derrick, allowed ventilation into No. 3 hold. They put extra tarpaulins over the hatch. They securely covered every ventilator that in any way wag connected with that particular hold. It was always best to attempt to smother a fire before pouring water into a ship.

One hour, two passed, while the captain paced the bridge talking lo the officer of the watch, occasionally going down to the lumber and inspecting the hatch some feet below. Vapour still rose from minute cracks and openings.

"Well," said Capt. Graham, "shoot the hose in there."

For a quarter of an hour two hose played through the small opening between the lumber and the deckhead, and then the captain called a halt. There was no further sign of vapour.

"I'll get the men to work to-morrow hauling that coal out," remarked the mate. "We'll have the ship pretty straight by then, hawsers put away and everything secure in case of bad weather."

"That's right," said Capt. Graham. "And don't bother me again for a few hours. I'm tired."

He disappeared into his cabin, undressed once more, and this time was allowed to fall asleep and remain asleep until the steward knocked on his door at 7 o'clock that evening and asked if he would like supper served.

THE NIGHT passed without further mishap. The sea remained sullen and leaden, the sickly sky dripped water, the Carradine soared and pitched, and over her bows flung on occasion a scattering of icy spray. Captain Graham, remaining on the bridge until midnight, turned in once more and slept until six, when he rose, washed and shaved, ate breakfast, and returned to the bridge to find the mate standing in the wing and staring fixedly toward No. 3 hatch.

"Well, well!" remarked Capt. Graham briskly. "What seems to be the trouble?"

'Thought I saw smoke again, sir," answered the mate. "She's still afire."

Both men stared then for long minutes, and both saw quite distinctly a single pale feather of vapour rise from the opening in the lumber, hover a moment, and then fade away.

"Fine place to put galley coal," said Capt. Graham once again. The mate scowled and made no reply. "Better get it out on deck," the captain added. "It might be the sacks smouldering." We can dump them."

"Where'll I put it on deck?" demanded the mate, gazing at the lumber which filled the Carradine from poop to fo'c'sle head.

A hint of laughter appeared in Capt. Graham's eyes.

"That's something for you to worry about," he stated, and then commenced pacing the bridge, his hands behind him and his head slightly bent. The mate swore under his breath, and then bellowed for the bos'n.

All the morning then both watches laboured to clear lumber from No. 3 hold until there was space enough for men to crawl through and get at the coal. The; passed it up sack by sack, heavy, water sodden, and it was carried on to the fiddley, the sacks cut and the sticky black stuff emptied out. The first, sacks were cold and soaked, but as the men below worked deeper into the pile they came to sacks that were hot and eventually to several that were smouldering.

The mate heaved a sigh of relief. It was something to know the fire had actually been located and put out.  No one wanted to be on a lumber carrier if a real blaze worked up. The coal, dumped in one huge pile on the fiddley, was covered with tarpaulin, round which the mate had lines run and made fast to handy ringbolts and cleats. He hoped no bad weather would come up.

That afternoon his hopes began to fall. The persistent rain ceased, and a slow, thick fog crept up from the. south, wrapping the Carradine in a white blanket that limited visibility to a scant half cable's length overside. The steady roar and bellow of the siren shook the vessel as she nosed blindly ahead on her course.

Soon after four bells, 2 o'clock, a taint bleating became apparent somewhere to starboard. Capt. Graham and the second mate stood in the bridge wing and listened. They caught the bleat again, and the second mate went to sound the Carradine's siren and to stand by the telegraphs. And then, quite abruptly, disaster came.

Out of the fog loomed a dark shape. The muffled bleat suddenly grew to a loud, hoarse bellow. Men shouted. Telegraphs jangled. The steam schooner Elmira, Eureka for Puget Sound, canted to port as her helm went hard over and, sweeping under the Carradine's stern, very neatly swept with her the rudder and screw. The Carradine was swung violently from south-west almost to north, and then she, squatted heavily in the trough like a tired animal while the steam schooner faded into the fog, her siren ablest again, lurching drunkenly and looking somewhat like a small dog afraid of what it had done. She vanished, and the Carradine was left alone.

Capt. Graham's hair seemed to bristle under his peaked cap as he stood stupefied on his bridge.

"We'll have to rig a jury rudder," said the mate some time later. "Lucky the weather's not too bad."

"Glass's falling," announced the second mate. Capt. Graham clucked impatiently.

"It'll be fast work, but we may make it," be said. "Get the rudder- rigged first, and then we'll see about the screw. If the weather makes, we can ride to a sea anchor. Get busy now! All hands!"

The noise of hammers and the' creaking of blocks began to rise from the Carradine's after deck. From' below came the firemen, the oilers, the engineers, the wipers. All! hands! While the seamen under Capt. Graham's orders worked on a rudder, the rest of the ship's company let go the cargo chains and commenced to transfer the lumber from the after deck to the foredeck, which was already ten deep in wood.

A substantial sea anchor was rigged out of huge new spars and lowered from the foc'sle head. It so happened that the ship's spare screw was carried in the shelter deck of No. 5 hatch, and to get at it necessitated more lumber's being shifted.  The amount of work was appalling. More than once, Capt. Graham, remembering he worked against time and a threatening storm, and that he was caught without power or guiding force upon one of the worst coasts in the world, was tempted to cut things short and order the men simply to pitch the lumber over side.

But that was against the ethics of the sea. Only in dire emergency might cargo be destroyed. And slowly and almost imperceptibly, with the transference of weight from aft, the stern of the Carradine lifted higher and higher from the sullen fog-hung sea.

Darkness came, and in the light of electric clusters the men laboured. The fog wreathed ghostlike about them. In spite of the clammy cold they streamed with sweat The cook kept coffee steaming in the galley. The steward replenished . huge stocks of corned beef, cheese, biscuits, and bread. There might have been complaints, might have been men dropping out from sheer exhaustion, but Capt. Graham moved briskly about, his keen blue eyes twinkling, his lips laughing, and a stream of conversation, light oaths and jests pouring from him. H< was a human dynamo. He made the hardest tasks easier. Did a man drop t plank on his foot, it was, "Well, well! Why've you got such big feet " Did a man curse his aching muscles is was, "Well, well! The Frisco girls'll cure that, Stand up to it, boys. Another hour, and we'll be through."

It was always just another hour. Dawn glowed through the whiteness, paling the clusters, showing the sweating faces, wan and drawn. Nearly all the lumber was off the after deck now and piled up for'ard. The spare screw had been hoisted from the shelter deck of No. 5 and was lying near the stern rail where the boss was rigging staging for lowering overside. Her after tanks pumped empty, to lighten her further in that quarter, the Carradine seemed almost to stand on her nose, her bows buried in the solemn fog-covered swells and the remnants of her mangled rudder and screw dripping and clear of the surface.

It was finished at last. 'The engineers climbed up from the frail swinging wet stages. The crude but effective jury rudder answered the helm. The screw turned, as a tentative letting of steam into the cylinders showed. The drive shaft was weakened, but the chief said with care it would hold. There was a brief pause then while men looked at each other strangely and wondered stupidly why they had been slaving so. One or two began to sit down on the deck. One or two commenced to shamble for'ard to the foc'sle.

"Stand to it, boys," said Capt. Graham cheerily. "We'll just throw the lumber back and make it fast, and then we'll be off."

They all looked at him, stared with sullen eyes at the small, erect man standing amid the litter of spanners, bolts, axes, saws, tackle, rope, and planks on the after deck. His blue eyes ran over them, coolly, twinkling a little as if amused. One by one the men shambled for'ard, seized a plank, and brought, it back on the after deck. Capt. Graham watched for a while, and then, summoning the mate to join the men and keep them on the move, he walked to the bridge, went up to the chartroom and sank on the settee there.

He stared at the glass and muttered an involuntary,  "Well, well!" The weather would break any minute now. Indeed the Carradine was already lifting the spray over her bows, and there was an uneasy pitch and roll to her hull that talked of a rising sea.

"We'll keep her to the sea anchor until we get that lumber made fast," said Capt. Graham to the third mate, who had the watch. Then he went aft to work with the men again.

They were grumbling now. They lagged. Sometimes they stood for half a minute or more gazing dully into the fog that was thinning before a rising wind. Capt. Graham shouted, swore, roused them again. His solitary, dogged will held them at their toil. And slowly half a million feet of lumber was transferred from the foredeck back again aft. By the time it was done, hours and hours later, the wind was a roaring, screaming fiend from the north, and the icy spume was rattling like gravel against the deckhouses and in the men's faces. The fog was wiped away, to disclose a murky black sky and a sea of livid green shot with slatey white, booming from horizon to misty horizon.

The engineers, firemen, wipers, and oilers had long since gone below to tend the engines. The seamen were left to run lashings over the deckload, and once this was fairly secure Capt. Graham sent them below to sleep while he and the mate and the second mate drove wedges under the heavy chains from rail to rail to tighten them. They went for'ard, set the engine ahead, cut adrift the sea anchor, and made good the course. The Carradine plunged ahead into the gale.

"Now," said Capt. Graham, "if the rudder'll hold, we're all right."

He did not feel so tired now. His exhausted body had passed the stage where muscles ached and every joint seemed sore. As long as he kept on his feet, moving, thinking, he was all right. He knew he ought to go below and sleep. He had competent officers. . But he was worried about the jury rudder and about his deck cargo. So he paced the bridge with the third mate, his every sense alert for a wild yaw of the vessel that would tell the rudder had gone. So that day passed.

Toward midnight, when the gale was at its worst, the lumber on the foredeck began to groan and creak ominously.

"Call all hands," said Capt. Graham quietly. "Ease her into the seas, mister.

We'll have to get some extra lashings, for'ard." '

It was a stormy task. The men swore and complained. Some refused to get up.  A few of the older seamen rose from force of habit and discipline, and wearily dressed. The little erect figure of Capt. Graham stood in the foc'sle doorway, flanked by his mates, and the cheery voices rose above the noises of the ship, and the oaths of tired men dragged from rest to labour again:—

"Stand to it, boys! An hour or soil see us through. Just a few lashings for'ard before we lose the stuff. You can turn in again then and sleep all day to-morrow."

"Lumber!" said one man thickly. "Damn the lumber! Let it go! What do we care!"

The mate caught that man's arm in iron fingers and dragged him up on deck.  The rest followed, swearing and grumbling still, but resigned to the task. And ahead of them went Capt. Graham, his voice coming brokenly through the wind scream, the spume staggering him now and then. '

Underfoot the lumber shifted and groaned beneath its chains. Here and there planks were already beginning to edge out of line. A giant baulk stuck half over the rail, fretting back and forth. A good roll, with a smashing sea and the lot would go. Half a million feet lost in the maw of the water. And it would take with it, like as not, backstays, winches, tackle, perhaps the mast. That it would burst open the hatches as it went was certain, and if that happened no man could tell what might follow.

Slipping, stumbling, falling, swearing, screaming impotent oaths into the face of the gale, the men of the Carradine laboured. Seas climbed up the hull, climbed the sides of the lumber, sent foam swilling across it. At intervals a sea would breach clear across, and there would be a wild scramble to hang on to backstays, to cling to the most, to lie down flat and grip with bleeding fingers the great chains beneath which the lumber surged. And through it all— alert, shouting, laughing, jesting, a thing of wire and whipcord— moved the master, his oilskins in shreds, his sou'-wester over one ear, his face bleeding where a sea had flung him against the foremast.

"Damned lumber!" a man would scream, lying back on a line. "Let it go! What do we care!"

"One more lashing," Capt. Graham would shout. "Just one more!"

It was always one more. From rail to rail across the lumber the lines ran. They were frapped one to the other to draw them tight. More wedges were hammered under the chains. The lumber ceased to surge and groan.

"All fast, sir! And one man gone— knocked from his feet and lost in the suck of the sea. Damned lumber!"

"All right!" shouted Capt. Graham. They could not hear him, so he waved his hand and essayed a last laugh. The men scrambled away, back to the wet foc'sle and their bunks. They turned in and slept, too tired even to swear now. Capt. Graham took his mates aft to put extra lashings on the lumber there. It was not surging and shifting yet, but it might.

The dawn was upon them again before they returned to the bridge. The mate took over. There was no sign of a wheel relief coming from for'ard, so the third mate took the helm and the second tried to sleep on the chartroom settee. Capt. Graham paced the bridge. The Carradine roared, and plunged through the wind-swept sea.

THE NEWS REPORTERS came aboard in San Francisco. The Carradine bad limped in with an ugly starboard list and her smokestack caked with salt. Her poop boats were matchwood. Her port bridge boat had gone, the woodwork along that side of the bridge was in splinters and the port companion was askew. The doorway to the saloon hung on one hinge, and the saloon itself was a wreck. Quite obviously the Carradine had a story to tell beyond the one concerning her jury rudder.

Capt. Graham was on the lower bridge when the reporters found him. They understood three men had been taken ashore to hospital with broken legs or arms or ribs. What had happened? They understood there had been a collision and that the difficult feat of seamanship had been performed of shipping a spare crew and rigging a jury rudder at sea. What was the truth?

Capt. Graham wondered dully why it mattered now. It was over with and done. He had brought his ship home with surprisingly little damage considering. He talked mechanically while he wondered. At last, the story taking shape, they grew personal, those reporters. How old was he? How long had ne been to sea? Had he ever been wrecked? What did he think of this and that?

"What," said one bright young man, his pencil poised, "would you consider the greatest thing at sea, the thing that counts most?"

Capt. Graham smiled and shut his tired lids over his sore eyes for a moment. He thought, "Yes, that's it! What is it we go to sea for, work for, spend our lives for? Queer. Never occurred to me before."

As in a panorama there marched across his vision his years on deep water, his troubles, his fights, his ships, his storms, his defeats. He saw the beginning of his voyage of the Carradine, the loading at Gray's Harbour; the second engineer with his broken leg; the fallen boom lying across the smashed case oil; the mate and the steward fighting in the galley; the hose spurting to put the fire out in the sacked coal; the men moving lumber after the steam schooner had ripped the screw and rudder clear; the men moving lumber back again; the struggle to check it when it was, surging, to save it from going overside; men injured in the fight; one man dead.

The answer was so very simple. He understood that now. AH his life and movement and work were directed to one end, for one great master. There was something greater than men and ships, greater than deep water itself, a veritable sovereign of the sea.

"There you are," said Capt. Graham, his face lighted with a strange inward fire. He motioned with one hand to the rattling winches, to the sweating men, to the lumber going sling-load by sling load on the wharf.

"I beg your pardon," said the bright young reporter. "I asked what would you consider the greatest thing at sea?"

"I'm telling you, said Captain Graham. He waved his hand again, "Cargo!"

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2: The Last Touches

Mrs. W. K. Clifford

1846-1929

Strand Magazine, Sep 1891

WITHOUT doubt Henry Carbouche was the greatest painter in France. He had done his best to convince the world of this, and the world had responded by trying to prove its conviction. A few inches of canvas that he had covered with paint were worth thousands. Sovereigns thought it a privilege to inspect his studio, decorations were offered him, but he cynically refused them, even though he was a Frenchman. Biographical writers pined for details of his life, but he supplied none. No one knew who he was, or where he had studied, or what had been his history. His pictures were famous, but it seemed as if his fame had had no beginning; it had arrived suddenly at its height. One year no one had known his work, the next it was spoken of almost as a national possession ; it had been considered one ever since. But he himself was hardly known, even by sight. He had no friends, no particular haunts, nothing that made him intimate with his fellow men, no one visited him except on business, and then the interviews were short, and to the point. It had happened of late years that he had been tempted now and then by some almost fabulous sum to paint a portrait. But his sitters knew him little better than the rest of the world, and could give but few details concerning him; for, while he painted, he was silent and formal, and all attempts to draw him into conversation failed utterly. The bow with which he wished his sitter adieu for the last time was as distant as the one which he had received him with; for he had never painted a woman. He was no longer young, fifty, more or less; he gave no clue to his age, but he was getting grey, and the lines on his face were many and deep. His expression was grave and stern, his bearing was almost distinguished. He appeared to take some interest in his work, but he was never eager about it. His pictures seemed to be things apart from him, to come into being as though some unseen power other than the man who held the brush inspired them. Besides his work, he took an interest in his investments, but that interest also seemed half curiosity; he shrugged his shoulders as he counted his thousands, and, putting away the record of his wealth in an iron safe, turned to his work again.

Through the winter he stayed in Paris in his house near the Pare Monceau. In the early summer he disappeared, and the only clue to his wandering was afforded, later on, perhaps by some picture he exhibited. His house was a splendid one. Its appointments were perfect; he looked at them with cold criticism, but that was all. The names of his servants he hardly remembered ; but he turned on them fiercely if they neglected their duties. His food, the food he ate, was the simplest, yet he stormed if the table were meagre. His studio was the one bare, undecorated room in the house ; it was absolutely destitute of all the luxuries that painters of these days affect. There were a couple of easy-chairs, and a table near the fire-place— a great open fire-place on which he burnt huge logs of wood ; for the rest, there were the actual necessities to his work, but that was all. He spent most of his time in the studio; he worked there, and sat there, day in, day out, save when he went for his two hours' drive, or took his way to the gorgeous salle à manger to eat his solitary meals. It was in the studio that his pictures were sold to eager buyers, who thought it an honour to stand in his presence. The other rooms of the house were always empty, waiting, it seemed, to form a setting to a life that refused to be lived, or belonging to a story that never was told, and that day by day slipt back farther and farther into the past.

There were many anecdotes told of Carbouche, all of them turning on a certain savagery that seemed to be in him ; as when he had painted the portrait of Alphonse Bubois, the millionaire, and had brought out the sinister expression on his face with a malignity that was almost startling. Or when his famous picture of the forest of St. Germain en Laye had suggested to everyone that its beauty was over rated— its terrace walk a long, straight road, its famous view merely an effect of distance and winding river that was, after all, well known in other views; even the dim city in the distance, with the thousands of human histories gathered together in the far-off mists, seemed to have some false quality in its poetry.

"And, oh, that forest," said an English girl, who stood before the picture in its place of honour in the salon, "I felt once as I walked down the terrace, and looked into the trim depths, that it was artificial. Now I know that it is. I believe that every tree was reared in a square box painted green, and let into the ground beneath, like a theatre growth. Perhaps even the squirrels are shams, and their bushy tails were bought at the furrier's and sewn on to make believe."

"Ah, Carbouche is a great painter," said her companion, as they passed on; "but he always brings out the cynical side of the world, and the worst aspect of nature."

ii

CARBOUCHE had returned to Paris. The logs were piled on the studio fire, for the room was chilly after its long spell of emptiness. In the painter's life there was little warmth, little of anything but work and silence, and his surroundings seemed to
express the condition of his soul. He strode up and down, looking at his easel, and the little, old-fashioned bureau for colours beside it. On a shelf to its left there were some brushes and a palette. Against the wall were one or two sketches, but they were slight and unfinished, for there was never any work of Carbouche's unsold, if money could buy it. The only other canvas in the room rested on the floor, with its face to the wall, half-hidden by an old worn portfolio. No one save Carbouche knew what was painted on it, and he had avoided looking at it for years, with a carefulness that was half- scorn, half superstition. Before the blazing fire were the two easy-chairs, and on the little table between them an open box of cigarettes. Carbouche sat down, and, lighting a cigarette, smoked vigorously until the end was thrown among the blazing logs.

There was a faint rumbling in the distance. It came nearer, it entered the gateway, and he knew by the grinding sound peculiar to the turning of a carriage on gravel that a visitor had arrived. He waited half resentfully, impatient at the prospect of being disturbed.

The servant entered with a card, "Milor," and he hesitated. Carbouche took the card, and said slowly, as if he, too, found the name difficult.

"The Earl of Harlekston. Ah, one moment, Auguste, I have forgotten."He sorted a note from a dozen on the mantel-piece, and read it. "Ask milor if he will enter." A minute later there appeared a middle-aged, well-groomed Englishman.

"Good morning, monsieur," the painter said stiffly. "I regret that you should have had the trouble of coming. I only returned last night, and found your note."

"I did not expect an answer," Lord Harlekston said in excellent French.

Carbouche, of course, could speak no other tongue.

"But I regret to have caused you a fruitless journey."

"I am delighted to have made it. It is, if you will allow me to say so, a great privilege to have entered your studio."

"I am flattered," the painter said, coldly, " but I apologise again for the unanswerd note."

"It is very good of you to apologise, but—"

"And I regret exceedingly—" Carbouche began again.

"Will you allow me to sit down?" the Englishman asked, and went towards one of the chairs.

"Certainly, monsieur;" but it was said half unwillingly. Lord Harlekston looked round the studio again, then at the artist, who had seated himself, facing his visitor.

"I see you affect the severities of life rather than the frivolities," the latter went on ; "it is quite a relief. One can breathe in your studio. London ones choke you; they are so full of gimcracks." Carbouche bowed ; he evidently wished to convey that it would be well to come to the point. Lord Harlekston took the hint. "I told you in my note that my wife wished to be painted by you, M. Carbouche."

"I am much honoured by the desire of Madame la Comtesse, and regret that I am not a portrait painter."

"She would think it an honour to sit to you," Lord Harlekston said courteously.

"I regret much that I am not a portrait painter," Carbouche repeated distantly.

"But," said Lord Harlekston hesitatingly, "I think I have seen one or two portraits that you have painted."

"That is possible ; but they have been very few, and for each one there have been reasons."

"Would it not be possible to make a reason in this case?"

"I have never painted a woman, monsieur. I do not wish to paint one, much as I am flattered at your desire that I should begin with madame."

Lord Harlekston was evidently a diplomat. "You increase my desire by that remark," he said suavely. "Is it not possible to persuade you? One feels a hesitation in speaking of money in connection with work like yours. Its value, I know, is immense."

"It is immense, monsieur," the painter said grimly and turned towards the fire.

"Which again increases my desire."

"I would not paint a woman under— " and he named an enormous sum, " and then I should prefer not to do it," and he looked into the fire almost savagely.

"I should be delighted to pay that sum, and most grateful to you besides."

"I am very busy, and I never did a portrait that took much time— three or four sittings at most."

"That would be fortunate, since our stay in Paris is very short."

"I would not give much time to a face that is, after all, of no interest to the world," the painter went on. "I do not mean this as any lack of compliment to Madame la Comtesse," he added. "But you will understand, monsieur, that the face of a woman, even if it is beautiful— and no doubt madame's is beautiful— is not so interesting as a man's face. Of course, I would not say this before the other sex; but we are alone, and can speak without reserve."

"I perfectly understand," Lord Harlekston said, " I am going to the Pyrenees next Thursday for a fortnight. Would it be possible while I am away?"

"I am very busy," Carbouche persisted.

"Of course, we are only talking of ahead; but even a sketch we should feel to be a great possession."

Carbouche looked at the fire, and hated the woman already. Still, deep in his soul there lurked a love of money, and the sum he had mentioned was a fabulous one for a portrait. No man in Europe but himself would have dared to ask it. He felt a triumph in remembering this, just as he felt a dogged triumph in adding to his wealth ; it gave him a sense of defiance towards the world, of having conquered it, and put it under his feet— that insolent world that in the beginning had given him nothing, had made him suffer and feel keenly that he was nobody, that he had not even money to study as he had wished, that he had only, and that in secret, a sense of power, a knowledge that the time would come that was now here. Yes, it was now here, but he knew that on its way it had stripped itself of all the gifts fate usually made to other men. After all, what had he in life ? His fame did not sweeten a single moment to any other person on earth. His great house was worse than a tomb ; it would never hold any dead, save, perhaps, his own lonely body. His money had served him nothing except to strengthen his feeling of defiance, and loneliness, and hatred towards the world. And yet he thought scornfully he would leave the world richer than he had found it, possessed of things in which it took a pride, but each one would be a sign of his power, his greatness, his scorn. He was perfectly aware of what the world would owe him, the world that once had grudged him all things. But this woman, what had he to do with women that he should paint her portrait? With almost a start he turned to his visitor, who had been watching him curiously.

"Monsieur," he said, " I am not very gallant but I would prefer to keep to the work I have already arranged. I am, as I said before, much flattered that an English lady should desire to have a picture of herself at my hands ; still, if I did a portrait at all, it would, perhaps, be only just that I should paint one of my own country-women."

"Then, let me give you the chance of paying a double compliment; for my wife is half French."

"Ah, madame is half French?"

"Her father was English, but her mother was French."

"It was so?" the painter repeated oddly, and he looked up as if an impossible idea were dawning upon him.

"When she was a girl, she lived at St. Germain en Laye, until she went to her father's people in England. They sent for her when she was nineteen or twenty."

"Ah, yes. I remember them sending for mademoiselle," Carbouche said. An expression of satisfaction broke over the Englishman's face.

"Now you understand, I see," he said, "my wife told me, if all other arguments failed, that I was to urge that you and she were old friends."

"Madame la Comtesse has an excellent memory," the painter said cynically, "it matches the other qualities I remember in mademoiselle."

"You were in the same pension?" Lord Harlekston said.

"I was staying with M. and Madame Carton at the Pavilion Rouge. I was young, monsieur, and venerated an old soldier above all things. Monsieur Carton was one ; but he had belonged to the old order of things, and despised the new one. He had left Paris, and he and Madame lived quietly at the Pavilion Rouge on such money as they had saved or could gather in giving instruction. Monsieur taught some of the youths in the town, and madame received one or two pupils into her family. That was how I knew mademoiselle ; she was staying there with her mother, Madame Brooke."

"I wonder you did not paint her then, she was very beautiful."

For a moment the expression on Carbouche's face softened as he answered: "Yes, she was very beautiful."

"But probably you were studying at one of the schools in Paris ; I never heard who had the honour of being your master."

"I never owned one, monsieur, and belong to no school. If there is fire in oneself, one can nourish it, and make it strong. If one's eye is not true, and one's hand is not docile, if one does not see the outward expression, and understand the soul that is beneath, then one had better give up the endeavour to give the world that which has not been created for it by someone else."

"But all men have studied in some school."

"All, with exceptions, monsieur."

"My wife tells me that you and she had many talks together."

"Madame is most kind to remember;" the painter's voice was cynical again; "for in those days I was nobody, and had nothing save ambitions." He was silent for a moment, and looked into the fire. "It was a pleasant ménage," he went on, as if he were talking to himself; "M. and Madame Carton, Madame Brooke and mademoiselle, one or two others, and myself who had been received because my father had also been a soldier, and was known to M. Carton."

"Was the Pavilion Rouge near the Chateau?" Lord Harlekston asked, remembering Carbouche's picture.

"Ah no, monsieur, it was half an hour from the Chateau, outside St. Germain altogether, on the road to the forest of Marly. But I am keeping you, monsieur. These recollections are after all of little interest. Express my compliments to madame."

"But the portrait, M. Carbouche?"

"I do not understand why madame should wish to sit to me; we have not met since she left St. Germain."

"She does wish it, and she hoped that you would consent for the sake of your old acquaintance, which it has always been a great pleasure to her to remember."

Carbouche frowned, and was silent for a moment, then suddenly he looked up.

"Monsieur," he said, " I should think it a pleasure to paint a portrait of Madame la Comtesse."

iii

THE LOGS were piled on the studio fire again. The light was carefully arranged. On the easel was a small canvas, large enough perhaps for a head and shoulders, but no more. On a slightly raised platform was a chair. Carbouche was awaiting his sitter ; and walked up and down expecting to hear again the sound that had disturbed him three mornings ago.

"Madame la Comtesse," he said to himself; "Madeline e-egh," and an ugly sound came from his lips, but it was an expression of pain. " Perhaps she wears the grey squirrel round her throat still. It must be a different throat from that of three and twenty years ago. Mon Dieu, but if things had come at the other end of life instead of at this"— he stopped before the portfolio in the corner, and pulled out the canvas from behind it. It represented some chestnut trees in a forest, and a youth who was trying to see the face of a girl, but she had turned away from him.

"I wish I had seen her eyes then, I should have known," he said. In a corner was written "Marly, 18—."

He put the picture back with a sigh, and paced up and down again. Then the door opened, . and a tall, graceful woman entered. Carbouche bowed formally, his face grew hard, but he looked curiously at his visitor, trying to see her features through the lace veil that covered them.

"How do you do, M. Carbouche ? It is indeed a pleasure to see you again." Her voice was low and sweet, and his heart stirred to it, but he set his teeth together and answered stiffly—

"Bon jour, madame ; I am to have the honour of painting your portrait."

"It is too good of you to consent," she said, and came a step forward. He listened with an odd gratitude at the rustle of her dress. Then he answered—

"To paint is my business in life, madame."

There was standing behind Lady Harlekston a trim-looking lady's maid; Carbouche looked at her inquiringly.

"It is only my maid, Susette," Lady Harlekston explained; "she will arrange me," and then she looked at Carbouche's face. "It is strange to meet you again; I have often wished—"

"We will begin your portrait, madame, at once if you will make yourself ready."

"Ah, yes, we must not waste your time; it is too precious. Susette," she unhooked her cloak, and the maid took it. With almost hungry eyes the painter watched her. The figure beneath the cloak was slim enough, though naturally in three and twenty years it had lost its girlishness. He had seen, too, the moment she entered, that the freedom of movement of old days had developed into a womanly ease that had with it especially an air of distinction. Then the maid undid her veil, which had been fastened by a little tortoise-shell arrow, and Carbouche saw in a moment, with his keen quick eyes that took in every detail and refused him any illusions, that, though her hair was golden, still its colouring was harsher than formerly.

"Ah," he thought, "there had been many winters since the summer end in which we said 'Good-bye'; and, when the sunshine goes, one has to make a substitute as best one can." She turned towards him a little reluctantly.

"I am changed," she said, with something that was almost pathetic in her voice, and a smile that asked him to contradict her, but he answered with extreme gravity.

"Naturally, madame, we are both changed— you are Madame la Comtesse, and I am an old man."

"Ah no, not old, monsieur," she said with a smile that was meant to be winning; a little dislike shot through him. Suddenly he saw her face, and something that was almost hatred took possession of him. The eyes that looked up at him were not as blue as formerly, and they had lost their look of trustfulness. Her eyebrows were fine and arched and darker than her hair. Lady Harlekston was not the daughter of a Frenchwoman for nothing, and knew well, as years advanced, how to offer nature the little attentions of art. There was a flush upon her cheek ; he remembered the flush of old, and knit his brows when he saw the one that was there now. And her lips had lost their moulding and their colour, her chin had taken to itself a little firmness, and about her face were lines that nothing would ever smooth away save death, which often, when it gathers in the years to itself, gathers in their footprints too, and leaves the face smooth as if the traveller, having reached the end of his circle, had met his youth again. There was no disguising it, on the face of Lady Harlekston and in her whole bearing, handsome and fashionable woman though she was counted, there was something artificial and worldly. Carbouche saw it, and forgave her nothing.

"And now, Susette, you may go; the sitting was to be two hours, was it not, monsieur? At one o'clock you can return; bring the carriage, for I shall be tired."

"Your maid can wait if you prefer it, madame. There is a chair by the fire."

"Ah no; she has some shopping to do. Besides, we are old friends, monsieur." There was something very French in her manner, even he recognised it. "And I want— I want," she lingered over the words until the door was shut behind the maid, "to have some talk, it would be impossible before a maid." Carbouche shrank back.

"Pardon, madame," he said, as he motioned her to the chair on the platform and looked for his charcoal stick; "but I have not the honour of being an old friend; it is not ten minutes since you arrived."

"I was thinking of years ago," she said in her low voice. "The years ago have no more concern with us, madame, than the dead who lie in their graves. To-day we have to think of your portrait. Will you have the goodness to turn a little more to the light?" and he stepped back to look at her pose.

"Am I very much changed?  she asked sadly.

"Time is an envious thing, madame, and takes something from us all," Carbouche said as he began to draw on his canvas, " it is seldom so self-denying as to take least from the beautiful."

She made a little grimace that had been studied, and it had its effect upon him accordingly. For a few minutes neither of them spoke.

"You were surprised when you heard who your sitter was to be Hen— M. Carbouche?" she corrected herself almost elaborately, and watched the effect of her seemingly careless slip upon him. His manner was colder and still more formal than before, and he answered —

"There are many unexpected things in life, Madame la Comtesse ; but as one grows old one is seldom much surprised," and again there was a silence.

"You find it difficult to talk while you paint?" she asked.

"As a rule I prefer to be silent, madame."

"I long so much to hear about yourself."

"I am flattered at madame's longing," he said coldly.

"I have watched your career with much interest."

"I am honoured at madame's interest," and he went on with his work.

Lady Harlekston was baffled. When he looked up at her there was no expression on his face except one of desire to accomplish accurately the portrait on which he was engaged. Evidently he worked with extraordinary quickness and decision. An hour passed, a good deal of progress had been made with the portrait, but the painter and his sitter were precisely on the terms they had been the moment after her arrival.

Presently she made a bold venture. "Have you been to St. Germain lately?" she asked suddenly.

"No, madame."

"It is a dear place," she said, "I long to see it again."

"That would not be difficult," he answered absently, as if his whole attention were given to his work. "It is not an hour from Paris, and the trains are frequent."

"It is full of memories, it would only make me sad," she said with a sigh, but he was silent. "It is a beautiful place," she added.

"It is not beautiful now, madame," he said grimly; "it is winter, and the leaves have fallen— St. Germain depends on its leaves; when they are gone, it is bare and ugly, its beauty is like that of a woman. As a rule a woman has little that is beautiful beneath her looks; when the summer goes St. Germain has nothing beneath its leaves."

"Youth and summer are not everything," she said almost piteously,

"Ah, no," he answered, "sometimes wisdom and knowledge come with age, and in winter there is time for reflection." Another silence. Carbouche went on with the portrait. Keenly and quickly he looked at her; surely and unhesitatingly his brush went to the canvas. The sitting was nearly at an end.

"Monsieur," she said softly, "I think you are very hard."

"Perhaps," and he shrugged his shoulders; "but one cannot help one's nature, it is one's misfortune or the reverse."

"I think," she went on reflectively, "it is a little inevitable— it is one of the qualities of genius, so many precious things are hard ; the diamond is hardest of all," she added plaintively.

"Madame is most ingenious, she would make one feel flattered even at the possession of one's defects," but there was no yielding in his voice. She was silent for a few minutes, he lifted his brush and pulled his thumb out of the palette. The sitting was over ; he looked at her curiously and then at his work. The carriage drove up in front of the house. With almost a gasp she asked—

"Do you never forgive?"

He looked at her straightly.

"Forgive ? Oh yes, we all do that sometimes."

"And does forgiveness make no difference? "she asked.

"I should perhaps forgive a burglar who broke in and stole," he answered; "but afterwards I should bar the door, knowing the manner of person who was possibly without."

"I want to speak of the past," she said, and put out her hands, then drew them back quickly.

"But this is my studio in Paris, madame. I have the honour to be painting your portrait, and, if you will have the goodness, we will confine our conversation to the things that concern it. Ah, here is your maid and your cloak ; I compliment you on its colour, it would be good to paint. On Thursday, then, at eleven, and with two more sittings, if we are diligent, the portrait will be finished. I wish Madame la Comtesse good day."

iv

LADY HARLEKSTON was sitting for the last time. The portrait was nearly finished. As a painting it was perfect, as a work of art— was it not Carbouche's? But it was as accurate and as merciless as a looking-glass. The face of the woman on the canvas was the face of the woman who sat, nothing was softened. The hair had that harshness dye gives it; the colour on the cheeks was the tint of that which had replaced the natural one on the original. Every line that time had set on her was reproduced, every year that she had lived could be counted; nay, it seemed as if every day and night of them had been in the painter's mind while he worked. She was in despair. That to go forth as her portrait painted by the immortal Carbouche ! That artificial, made-up- looking face of who shall say how many years and forty to be known to the world as hers ; it would be a shame and reproach even to her descendants  Once or twice she tried to remonstrate, but words had no effect on him; he was amenable to no hints. Nothing deceived him, no half turning from the light availed, no wile for a single second served its purpose. His eye as it fell upon her seemed to see her through and through, till her cheeks burned and her throat trembled ; and his brush unerringly went to the canvas, and without pity or scruple set down what he had seen.

"Will it be finished to-day?" she asked chokingly.

"It is nearly finished now, madame."

"And is that colour really mine?"

He looked up at her in surprise. "But certainly, madame."

"You have put in all my wrinkles," she said gently.

"I regret, but cannot help them. The years do not like to be forgotten, they set a mark on us as they go by ; and it was madame's portrait that I was asked to paint."

"You might have left out a few," she said; "a woman has her vanities."

"I might have left out one eye, madame, but then it would not have been a portrait."

"It makes me sad to see them," she said, "they remind me — they are like the beads we tell beside the dead, one for every year, and hope, and joy that is gone."

"Madame is poetic," and he touched the throat of the portrait with his brush. She pulled up the lace about her own throat a little higher. He saw it, and took away some of the fairness from the one he had painted. "It is too white," he whispered, and she writhed. Slowly she rose, and going to her cloak felt in its pocket.

"Monsieur," she asked, "is it too late to paint this collar round my throat? It is grey squirrel, and I have possessed it many years." His eye fell on it, and with a little start he turned away.

"It is too late," he answered firmly, and deepened the line about the mouth.

"You work so quickly," she pleaded; "paint it in, monsieur. You have been hard to me." The last words were almost whispered. " But now this last sitting you will be a little gentle: we shall never meet again," she added sadly in a voice that sounded prophetic.

"There is no time;" but he seemed wavering.

"But the portrait is nearly done," she said; "see, I will fasten the collar here," and she put it round part of the ornamentation on the back of the chair on which she had been sitting. "Try and paint it, monsieur, while I rest a little, for I am tired and cold."

She seemed weary. There was something pathetic in her demeanour as she went slowly towards one of the chairs by the little table. Perhaps it softened him, for he began to paint in the grey squirrel. A long silence. Once his eyes wandered to her as she sat over the fire, her face turned from him, but her beautiful figure thrown into relief by the blaze from the logs. Presently she got up, and walked round the studio, and again he listened gratefully to the rustle of her dress, it was so unusual a sound in that room.

"Monsieur," she said, " there is a canvas behind the portfolio in this corner. It has its face turned towards the wall, but if there is a picture on it, may I see it?"

"If I wished it seen, its face would not be towards the wall; therefore, madame must excuse it."

She moved away, and stood by his side, the left side, close to the hand that held the palette. He went on with his work almost as if he did not know she was there. The grey collar was nearly finished ; but he lingered over the picture, touching it here and there, with a little stroke, almost as if he were dreaming. He brushed away a wrinkle that showed in the throat above the fur. She went a little closer.

"Henri," she said, softly, "the chestnuts are falling in the forest of Marly;" the brush nearly fell from his hand.

"Yes," he answered; "they are falling, and the leaves lie dead, as all things lie dead sooner or later." His voice had lost its harshness.

"The summer is over, but it is not winter yet, and all things are not dead. Ah! go on, I like to watch you. The little grey squirrel makes me think—"

"Why did you keep it?" he asked, through his teeth.

"To remember— though it was not possible to forget," she answered. "Give it to me; let me put it round my throat."

"Madame will be seated again," he said, trying to fall back into his most formal manner.

"No, let me stand here, you have so nearly finished, and do not want me to sit again? Thank you, monsieur," and she put the collar round her throat. "I love it," she whispered. "No, don't stop," she went on, hurriedly, "and don't look at me, there is no necessity, you do not forget my face."

"No, I do not forget," he answered, with his eyes on the picture.

"Surely that chin is a little heavy above the collar. Nay, feel it— yes— yes, just this once." She rested her face on his sleeve for a moment, and softly pulled his right hand towards the palette, and then the left one towards her chin. "The touch of the fur, does it make you remember?" she asked, as she raised her head.

"I have never forgotten," he answered, with a little break in his voice; and the chin on the canvas grew round again, and the lines about it were smoothed away.

She spoke again, hardly above her breath —

"I so often think of the forest," she said, "and the path towards where the fountains had been : we played our little play—"

"It was only a play," he half turned his head towards her ; but softly she put up her hand, and pushed it from her.

"No," she said, "think of the girl who was, Henri," her voice was almost tragic in its sweetness; "and of how she and you pretended they were back in the days of the Queen. You were walking with me en poh'sson, and I was a Court lady in the habit de Marly."

"It was only a play," he repeated.

"It was much more to me," she answered. "You said once when the wind blew among my hair that it was like the marriage of the sunshine and the wind. Take away the smoothness there—" (she nodded at the picture), "and put in a suggestion of the wind, so that I may remember."

"It is all too late," he said bitterly, as he took up some colour from his palette of a brighter hue than he had already used, and worked it into the hair. "It was like gold," he said to himself. She was almost bitter when she spoke again.

"I can see your face as if it were yesterday, but you have forgotten."

The reproach seemed to sting him. "Never."

It was like a cry of pain.

She gave a long sigh and went on— "I think of your eyes sometimes, as they looked down at me. Have you forgotten mine?"

"I never forgot, Madeline," he exclaimed, and turned towards her again ; but again she put up her hand, and kept his face from her.

"No, no," she said; "go on, and don't look at me, or think of me, as I am now. Think of me as I was then, and stood beneath the chestnuts, and felt the colour come to my face ; surely it was not like that you have put on my face there. You said— but I am afraid to think of your words—" (and there was a quiver in her voice); "I have so often wondered if they were true."

"They were all true," and he touched the cheeks of the portrait.

"You said that you loved me."

"I did tell you I loved you, Madeline."

"But you forgot soon— you have loved other women since, and said the same words to them!"

"I have said them to no other woman. I have been dumb, and lived remembering," and still, without knowing it, his brush wandered over the canvas, till the blue had come into the eyes again, and the gold to the hair, and the softness of youth to the skin, till the face of the made-up, middle-aged woman had gone, and in its stead remained the beautiful one of twenty years before. And a smile broke over the stern face as he watched lovingly the effect of every touch his brush made.

"I loved you," he repeated simply, "and have lived alone for your sake." Then suddenly he put down the brush, and turned quickly. She bent her head so that he should not see her face, but he stooped till his lips for a minute touched the grey fur about her throat. There was a sound of wheels, beneath; the carriage had come for her,

"Tell me you loved me," he said; "that you, too, meant your words."

She put her hands over her face, and uneasily he saw the diamonds on her fingers. The door opened, and with a start they drew back.

"Madame," said Susette, entering hurriedly, " milor has returned suddenly. Important business takes him to England; we leave Paris in two hours' time. The portrait is to go finished or unfinished."

"Ah! take it, Susette, but carry it carefully, for it is not yet dry," Lady Harlekston said impetuously.

"And here is a letter for milady; milord told me to ask you to open it immediately."

"Yes, yes; but take the portrait, Susette. Let it go," she whispered to Carbouche, who stepped forward as Susette went towards the easel.

"But I must touch it," he said, bewildered.

"Ah! no, no," she whispered again. "Let it go. Carry it carefully, Susette, and rest it against the back seat. You need not return. I will descend in a moment."

As Susette vanished, Lady Harlekston opened the letter from her husband. There was an envelope enclosed. She looked at the address, and hurriedly put on her cloak.

"But now, Madeline, tell me— tell me," Carbouche said, eagerly.

She looked up; he saw her face, and started back with dismay.

"Ah! monsieur," she said politely, "this letter is for you. And now—"

She went two steps towards the door.

"But tell me," he said, with a gasp; "in this last moment, before you go, tell me, did you mean—"

A mocking laugh came from her lips.

"Oh! monsieur," she said. "But the portrait is finished, and it is charming. Adieu! A million thanks," and she swept from the room.

"Madeline!" he exclaimed, petrified; but she was already descending the stairs.

"Adieu!" she laughed up at him. "The portrait is finished, and the last touches were perfect. That is all I wanted."

He drew back, and stood looking at the empty easel, bewildered. There was a grating sound on the gravel. She had gone. Mechanically he tore open the envelope in his hand. A dozen bank-notes fluttered from it, and scattered themselves at his feet.

______________________________

3: The Mystery of Sasassa Valley

Arthur Conan Doyle

Chambers's Journal  6 Sep 1879

The first ever story published by Conan Doyle, then aged 20

DO I KNOW why Tom Donahue is called "Lucky Tom?" Yes; I do; and that is more than one in ten of those who call him so can say. I have knocked about a deal in my time, and seen some strange sights, but none stranger than the way in which Tom gained that sobriquet and his fortune with it. For I was with him at the time. Tell it? Oh, certainly; but it is a longish story and a very strange one; so fill up your glass again, and light another cigar while I try to reel it off. Yes; a very strange one; beats some fairy stories I have heard; but it's true sir, every word of it. There are men alive at Cape Colony now who'll remember it and confirm what I say. Many a time has the tale been told round the fire in Boers' cabins from Orange State to Griqualand; yes, and out in the Bush and at the Diamond Fields too.

I'm roughish now sir; but I was entered at the Middle Temple once, and studied for the Bar. Tom— worse luck!— was one of my fellow-students; and a wildish time we had of it, until at last our finances ran short, and we were compelled to give up our so-called studies, and look about for some part of the world where two young fellows with strong arms and sound constitutions might make their mark. In those days the tide of emigration had scarcely begun to set in towards Africa, and so we thought our best chance would be down at Cape Colony. Well— to make a long story short— we set sail, and were deposited in Cape Town with less than five pounds in our pockets; and there we parted. We each tried our hands at many things, and had ups and downs; but when, at the end of three years, chance led each of us up-country and we met again, we were, I regret to say, in almost as bad a plight as when we started.

Well, this was not much of a commencement; and very disheartened we were, so disheartened that Tom spoke of going back to England and getting a clerkship. For you see we didn't know that we had played out all our small cards, and that the trumps were going to turn up. No; we thought our "hands" were bad all through. It was a very lonely part of the country that we were in, inhabited by a few scattered farmers, whose houses were stockaded and fenced in to defend them against the Kaffirs. Tom Donahue and I had a little hut right out in the Bush; but we were known to possess nothing, and to be handy with our revolvers, so we had little to fear. There we waited doing odd jobs, and hoping that something would turn up. Well, after we had been there about a month something did turn up upon a certain night, something which was the making of both of us; and it's about that night sir, that I'm going to tell you. I remember it well. The wind was howling past our cabin, and the rain threatened to burst in our rude window. We had a great wood-fire crackling and sputtering on the hearth, by which I was sitting mending a whip, while Tom was lying in his bunk groaning disconsolately at the chance which had led him to such a place.

"Cheer up, Tom— cheer up," said I. "No man ever knows what may be awaiting him."

"Ill-luck, ill-luck, Jack," he answered. "I always was an unlucky dog. Here have I been three years in this abominable country; and I see lads fresh from England jingling the money in their pockets, while I am as poor as when I landed. Ah, Jack, if you want to keep your head above water, old friend, you must try your fortune away from me."

"Nonsense, Tom; you're down in your luck to-night. But hark! Here's some one coming outside. Dick Wharton, by the tread; he'll rouse you, if any man can."

Even as I spoke the door was flung open, and honest Dick Wharton, with the water pouring from him, stepped in, his hearty red face looking through the haze like a harvest-moon. He shook himself, and after greeting us sat down by the fire to warm himself.

"Whereaway, Dick, on such a night as this?" said I. "You'll find the rheumatism a worse foe than the Kaffirs, unless you keep more regular hours."

Dick was looking unusually serious, almost frightened, one would say, if one did not know the man. "Had to go," he replied— "had to go. One of Madison's cattle has been straying down Sasassa Valley, and of course none of our blacks would go down that Valley at night; and if we lad waited till morning, the brute would have been in Kaffirland."

"Why wouldn't they go down Sasassa Valley at night?" asked Tom.

"Kaffirs, I suppose," said I.

"Ghosts," said Dick.

We both laughed.

"I suppose they didn't give such a matter-of-fact fellow as you a sight of their charms?" said Tom from the bunk.

"Yes," said Dick seriously— "yes; I saw what the niggers talk about; and I promise you, lads, I don't want ever to see it again."

Tom sat up in his bed. "Nonsense, Dick; you're joking, man! Come, tell us all about it. The legend first, and your own experience afterwards. Pass him over the bottle, Jack."

"Well, as to the legend," began Dick "it seems that the niggers have had it handed down to them that Sasassa Valley is haunted by a frightful fiend. Hunters and wanderers passing down the defile have seen its glowing eyes under the shadows of the cliff; and the story goes that whoever has chanced to encounter that baleful glare, has had his after-life blighted by the malignant power of this creature. Whether that be true or not," continued Dick ruefully, "I may have an opportunity of judging for myself."

"Go on, Dick— go on," cried Tom. "Let's hear about what you saw."

"Well, I was groping down the Valley, looking for that cow of Madison's, and I had, I suppose, got half-way down, where a black craggy cliff juts into the ravine on the right, when I halted to have a pull at my flask. I had my eye fixed at the time upon the projecting cliff I have mentioned, and noticed nothing unusual about it. I then put up my flask and took a step or two forward, when in a moment there burst apparently from the base of the rock, about eight feet from the ground and a hundred yards from me, a strange lurid glare, flickering and oscillating, gradually dying away and then reappearing again. No, no; I've seen many a glow-worm and firefly nothing of that sort. There it was burning away, and I suppose I gazed at it, trembling in every limb, for fully ten minutes. Then I took a step forwards, when instantly it vanished, vanished like a candle blown out. I stepped back again; but it was some time before I could find the exact spot and position from which it was visible. At last, there it was, the weird reddish light, flickering away as before. Then I screwed up my courage, and made for the rock; but the ground was so uneven that it was impossible to steer straight; and though I walked along the whole base of the cliff, I could see nothing. Then I made tracks for home; and I can tell you, boys, that until you remarked it, I never knew it was raining, the whole way along. But hullo! what's the matter with Tom?"

What indeed? Tom was now sitting with his legs over the side of the bunk, and his whole face betraying excitement so intense as to be almost painful. "The fiend would have two eyes. How many lights did you see, Dick? Speak out!"

"Only one."

"Hurrah!" cried Tom— "that's better!" Whereupon he kicked the blankets into the middle of the room, and began pacing up and down with long feverish strides. Suddenly he stopped opposite Dick, and laid his hand upon his shoulder: "I say, Dick, could we get to Sasassa Valley before sunrise?"

"Scarcely," said Dick.

"Well, look here; we are old friends, Dick Wharton, you and I. Now, don't you tell any other man what you have told us, for a week. You'll promise that; won't you?"

I could see by the look on Dick's face as he acquiesced that he considered poor Tom to be mad; and indeed I was myself completely mystified by his conduct. I had, however, seen so many proofs of my friend's good sense and quickness of apprehension, that I thought it quite possible that Wharton's story had had a meaning in his eyes which I was too obtuse to take in.

All night Tom Donahue was greatly excited, and when Wharton left he begged him to remember his promise, and also elicited from him a description of the exact spot at which he had seen the apparition, as well as the hour at which it appeared. After his departure, which must have been about four in the morning, I turned into my bunk and watched Tom sitting by the fire splicing two sticks together, until I fell asleep. I suppose I must have slept about two hours; but when I awoke, Tom was still sitting working away in almost the same position. He had fixed the one stick across the top of the other so as to form a rough T, and was now busy in fitting a smaller stick into the angle between them, by manipulating which, the cross one could be either cocked up or depressed to any extent. He had cut notches too in the perpendicular stick, so that by the aid of the small prop, the cross one could be kept in any position for an indefinite time.

"Look here, Jack!" he cried, whenever he saw that I was awake, "Come, and give me your opinion. Suppose I put this cross-stick pointing straight at a thing, and arranged this small one so as to keep it so, and left it, I could find that thing again if I wanted it— don't you think I could, Jack— don't you think so?" he continued nervously, clutching me by the arm.

"Well," I answered, "it would depend on how far off the thing was, and how accurately it was pointed. If it were any distance, I'd cut sights on your cross-stick; then a string tied to the end of it, and held in a plumb-line forwards, would lead you pretty near what you wanted. But surely, Tom, you don't intend to localise the ghost in that way?"

"You'll see to-night, old friend— you'll see tonight. I'll carry this to the Sasassa Valley. You get the loan of Madison's crowbar, and come with me; but mind you tell no man where you are going, or what you want it for."

All day Tom was walking up and down the room, or working hard at the apparatus. His eyes were glistening, his cheek hectic, and he had all the symptoms of high fever. "Heaven grant that Dick's diagnosis be not correct!" I thought, as I returned with the crowbar; and yet, as evening drew near, I found myself imperceptibly sharing the excitement.

About six o'clock Tom sprang to his feet and seized his sticks. "I can stand it no longer, Jack," he cried; "up with your crowbar, and hey for Sasassa Valley! To-night's work, my lad, will either make us or mar us! Take your six-shooter, in case we meet the Kaffirs. I daren't take mine, Jack," he continued, putting his hands upon my shoulders— "I daren't take mine; for if my ill-luck sticks to me to-night, I don't know what I might not do with it."

Well, having filled our pockets with provisions, we set out, and as we took our wearisome way towards the Sasassa Valley, I frequently attempted to elicit from my companion some clue as to his intentions. But his only answer was: "Let us hurry on, Jack. Who knows how many have heard of Wharton's adventure by this time! Let us hurry on, or we may not be first in the field!"

Well sir, we struggled on through the hills for a matter of ten miles; till at last, after descending a crag, we saw opening out in front of us a ravine so sombre and dark that it might have been the gate of Hades itself; cliffs many hundred feet high shut in on every side the gloomy boulder-studded passage which led through the haunted defile into Kaffirland. The moon rising above the crags, threw into strong relief the rough irregular pinnacles of rock by which they were topped, while all below was dark as Erebus.

"The Sasassa Valley?" said I.

"Yes," said Tom.

I looked at him. He was calm now; the flush and feverishness had passed away; his actions were deliberate and slow. Yet there was a certain rigidity in his face and glitter in his eye which shewed that a crisis had come.

We entered the pass, stumbling along amid the great boulders. Suddenly I heard a short quick exclamation from Tom. "That's the crag!" he cried, pointing to a great mass looming before us in the darkness. "Now Jack, for any favour use your eyes! We're about a hundred yards from that cliff, I take it; so you move slowly towards one side, and I'll do the same towards the other. When you see anything, stop, and call out. Don't take more than twelve inches in a step, and keep your eye fixed on the cliff about eight feet from the ground. Are you ready?"

"Yes." I was even more excited than Tom by this time. What his intention or object was, I could not conjecture, beyond that he wanted to examine by daylight the part of the cliff from which the light came. Yet the influence of the romantic situation and of my companion's suppressed excitement was so great, that I could feel the blood coursing through my veins and count the pulses throbbing at my temples.

"Start!" cried Tom; and we moved off, he to the right, Ito the left, each with our eyes fixed intently on the base of the crag. I had moved perhaps twenty feet, when in a moment it burst upon me. Through the growing darkness there shone a small ruddy glowing point, the light from which waned and increased, flickered and oscillated, each change producing a more weird effect than the last. The old Kaffir superstition came into my mind, and I felt a cold shudder pass over me. In my excitement, I stepped a pace backwards, when instantly the light went out, leaving utter darkness in its place; but when I advanced again, there was the ruddy glare glowing from the base of the cliff. "Tom, Tom!" I cried.

"Ay, ay!" I heard him exclaim, as he hurried over towards me.

"There it is— there, up against the cliff!"

Tom was at my elbow. "I see nothing," said he.

"Why, there, there, man, in front of you!" I stepped to the right as I spoke, when the light instantly vanished from my eyes.

But from Tom's ejaculations of delight it was clear that from my former position it was visible to him also. "Jack," he cried, as he turned and wrung my hand — "Jack, you and I can never complain of our luck again. Now heap up a few stones where we are standing.— That's right. Now we must fix my sign-post firmly in at the top. There! It would take a strong wind to blow that down; and we only need it to hold out till morning. Oh, Jack, my boy, to think that only yesterday we were talking of becoming clerks, and you saying that no man knew what was awaiting him too! By Jove, Jack, it would make a good story!"

By this time we had firmly fixed the perpendicular stick in between two large stones; and Tom bent down and peered along the horizontal one. For fully a quarter of an hour he was alternately raising and depressing it, until at last, with a sigh of satisfaction, he fixed the prop into the angle, and stood up. "Look along, Jack," he said. "You have as straight an eye to take a sight as any man I know of."

I looked along. There, beyond the further sight was the ruddy scintillating speck, apparently at the end of the stick itself, so accurately had it been adjusted. "And now, my boy," said Tom, "let's have some supper, and a sleep. There's nothing more to be done to-night; but we'll need all our wits and strength to-morrow. Get some sticks, and kindle a fire here, and then we'll be able to keep an eye on our signal-post, and see that nothing happens to it during the night."

Well sir, we kindled a fire, and had supper with the Sasassa demon's eye rolling and glowing in front of us the whole night through. Not always in the same place though; for after supper, when I glanced along the sights to have another look at it, it was nowhere to be seen. The information did not, however, seem to disturb Tom in any way. He merely remarked: "It's the moon, not the thing, that has shifted;" and coiling himself up, went to sleep.

By early dawn we were both up, and gazing along our pointer at the cliff; but we could make out nothing save one dead monotonous slatey surface, rougher perhaps at the part we were examining than elsewhere, but otherwise presenting nothing remarkable.

"Now for your idea, Jack!" said Tom Donahue, unwinding a long thin cord from round his waist. "You fasten it, and guide me while I take the other end." So saying he walked off to the base of the cliff, holding one end of the cord, while I drew the other taut, and wound it round the middle of the horizontal stick, passing it through the sight at the end. By this means I could direct Tom to the right or left, until we had our string stretching from the point of attachment, through the sight, and on to the rock, which it struck about eight feet from the ground. Tom drew a chalk circle of about three feet diameter round the spot, and then called to me to come and join him. "We've managed this business together, Jack," he said, "and we'll find what we are to find, together." The circle he had drawn embraced a part of the rock smoother than the rest, save that about the centre there were a few rough protuberances or knobs. One of these Tom pointed to with a cry of delight. It was a roughish brownish mass about the size of a man's closed fist, and looking like a bit of dirty glass let into the wall of the cliff. "That's it!" he cried— "that's it!"

"That's what?"

"Why, man, a diamond, and such a one as there isn't a monarch in Europe but would envy Tom Donahue the possession of. Up with your crowbar, and we'll soon exorcise the demon of Sasassa Valley!"

I was so astounded that for a moment I stood speechless with surprise, gazing at the treasure which had so unexpectedly fallen into our hands.

"Here, hand me the crowbar," said Tom. "Now, by using this little round knob which projects from the cliff here, as a fulcrum, we may be able to lever it off.— Yes; there it goes. I never thought it could have come so easily. Now, Jack, the sooner we get back to our hut and then down to Cape Town, the better."

We wrapped up our treasure, and made our way across the hills, towards home. On the way, Tom told me how, while a law-student in the Middle Temple, he had come upon a dusty pamphlet in the library, by one Jans van Hounym, which told of an experience very similar to ours, which had befallen that worthy Dutchman in the latter part of the seventeenth century, and which resulted in the discovery of a luminous diamond. This tale it was which had come into Tom's head as he listened to honest Dick Wharton's ghost-story; while the means which he had adopted to verify his supposition sprang from his own fertile Irish brain.

"We'll take it down to Cape Town," continued Tom, "and if we can't dispose of it with advantage there, it will be worth our while to ship for London with it. Let us go along to Madison's first, though; he knows something of these things, and can perhaps give us some idea of what we may consider a fair price for our treasure."

We turned off from the track accordingly, before reaching our hut, and kept along the narrow path leading to Madison's farm. He was at lunch when we entered; and in a minute we were seated at each side of him, enjoying South African hospitality.

"Well," he said, after the servants were gone, "what's in the wind now? I see you have something to say to me. What is it?"

Tom produced his packet, and solemnly untied the handkerchiefs which enveloped it. "There!" he said, putting his crystal on the table; "what would you say was a fair price for that?"

Madison took it up and examined it critically. "Well," he said, laying it down again, "in its crude state about twelve shillings per ton."

"Twelve shillings!" cried Tom, starting to his feet. "Don't you see what it is?"

"Rock-salt!"

"Rock fiddle; a diamond."

"Taste it!" said Madison.

Tom put it to his lips, dashed it down with a dreadful exclamation, and rushed out of the room.

I felt sad and disappointed enough myself; but presently remembering what Tom had said about the pistol, I, too, left the house, and made for the hut, leaving Madison open-mouthed with astonishment. When I got in, I found Tom lying in his bunk with his face to the wall, too dispirited apparently to answer my consolations. Anathematising Dick and Madison, the Sasassa demon, and everything else, I strolled out of the hut, and refreshed myself with a pipe after our wearisome adventure. I was about fifty yards away from the hut, when I heard issuing from it the sound which of all others I least expected to hear. Had it been a groan or an oath, I should have taken it as a matter of course; but the sound which caused me to stop and take the pipe out of my mouth was a hearty roar of laughter! Next moment, Tom himself emerged from the door, his whole face radiant with delight. "Game for another ten-mile walk, old fellow?"

"What! for another lump of rock-salt, at twelve shillings a ton?"

"'No more of that, Hal, an you love me,'" grinned Tom. "Now look here, Jack. What blessed fools we are to be so floored by a trifle! Just sit on this stump for five minutes, and I'll make it as clear as daylight. You've seen many a lump of rock-salt stuck in a crag, and so have I, though we did make such a mull of this one. Now, Jack, did any of the pieces you have ever seen shine in the darkness brighter than any fire-fly?"

"Well, I can't say they ever did."

"I'd venture to prophesy that if we waited until night, which we won't do, we would see that light still glimmering among the rocks. Therefore, Jack, when we took away this worthless salt, we took the wrong crystal. It is no very strange thing in these hills that a piece of rock-salt should be lying within a foot of a diamond. It caught our eyes, and we were excited, and so we made fools of ourselves, and left the real stone behind. Depend upon it, Jack, the Sasassa gem is lying within this magic circle of chalk upon the face of yonder cliff. Come, old fellow, light your pipe and stow your revolver, and we'll be off before that fellow Madison has time to put two and two together."

I don't know that I was very sanguine this time. I had begun in fact to look upon the diamond as a most unmitigated nuisance. However, rather than throw a damper on Tom's expectations, I announced myself eager to start. What a walk it was! Tom was always a good mountaineer, but his excitement seemed to lend him wings that day, while I scrambled along after him as best I could. When we got within half a mile he broke into the "double," and never pulled up until he reached the round white circle upon the cliff. Poor old Tom! when I came up, his mood had changed, and he was standing with his hands in his pockets, gazing vacantly before him with a rueful countenance.

"Look!" he said— "look!" and he pointed at the cliff. Not a sign of anything in the least resembling a diamond there. The circle included nothing but flat slate-coloured stone, with one large hole, where we had extracted the rock-salt, and one or two smaller depressions. No sign of the gem. "I've been over every inch of it," said poor Tom. "It's not there. Some one has been here and noticed the chalk, and taken it. Come home, Jack; I feel sick and tired. Oh! had any man ever luck like mine!"

I turned to go, but took one last look at the cliff first. Tom was already ten paces off.

"Honor!" I cried, "don't you see any change in that circle since yesterday?"

"What d'ye mean?" said Tom.

"Don't you miss a thing that was there before?"

"The rock-salt?" said Tom.

"No; but the little round knob that we used for a fulcrum. I suppose we must have wrenched it off in using the lever. Let's have a look at what it's made of."

Accordingly, at the foot of the cliff we searched about among the loose stones.

"Here you are, Jack! We've done it at last! We're made men!"

I turned round, and there was Tom radiant with delight, and with a little corner of black rock in his hand. At first sight it seemed to be merely a chip from the cliff; but near the base there was projecting from it an object which Tom was now exultingly pointing out. It looked at first something like a glass eye; but there was a depth and brilliancy about it such as glass never exhibited. There was no mistake this time; we had certainly got possession of a jewel of great value; and with light hearts we turned from the valley, bearing away with us the "fiend" which had so long reigned there.

There sir; I've spun my story out too long, and tired you perhaps. You see when I get talking of those rough old days, I kind of see the little cabin again, and the brook beside it, and the bush around, and seem to hear Tom's honest voice once more. There's little for me to say now. We prospered on the gem. Tom Donahue, as you know, has set up here, and is well known about town. I have done well, farming and ostrich-raising in Africa. We set old Dick Wharton up in business, and he is one of our nearest neighbours. If you should ever be coming up our way sir, you'll not forget to ask for Jack Turnbull— Jack Turnbull of Sasassa Farm.

___________________________

4: Ashes of Circumstance

J. U. Giesy

1877–1947

Weird Tales Sep 1925

“COME!” said the chief of police in response to a rap on his door.

An orderly entered.

“Chief, there’s a man outside says he has information about that Arnaut business last night. He won’t give it to anybody but you.”

The chief puffed at the cigar he was smoking and nodded in decision.

“Show him in,” he directed.

The orderly withdrew.

Presently the door opened again, to admit a dark-complexioned man with skin as sallow as yellow wax under the morning light. Dark eyes lurked at the back of shadowed sockets. He paused beside the end of the chief’s desk.

“If I am correct,” he began, speaking without any preliminary greeting, "your men were this morning summoned to the residence of a man known as Jean Arnaut. They found the dead bodies of a man and a woman in the drawing room of the house. The man was lying on the floor. The woman was decently placed upon a couch. She was Arnaut’s wife.”

The chief nodded again.

“You’re correct enough,” he said slowly. “Absolutely correct. They said you knew something about it. It appears they were right. Well—”

“Permit me to sit down.” His visitor sank into a chair.

“I would ask that you allow me to tell what I know in my own way. You see— I’ve taken all night to make up my mind as to my course in this affair. I’ve known Arnaut rather well for years.

“The double murder— for it was murder, chief, occurred last night. It was the climax of months of mental agony for Arnaut. But I am sure he never dreamed what real agony was until the last twelve hours. Do you know much about him, chief?”

The chief shook his head.

“At least you probably know that he is a man of large interests which frequently require his absence from the city for days at a time. He is rich. His home was such as gives one an instant appreciation of the owner’s standing, if you know what I mean. At the time of his marriage, Jean spared no expense in preparing it for the reception of his bride. He wanted it to be, if anything, more beautiful and charming than the one she left—”

“Wait,” the chief interrupted. “Why are you telling me all this?”

“Why?”

The man before him met his regard in what seemed a vague surprize.

“Why— because of what happened last night. Arnaut’s wife was a beautiful woman— a woman in a thousand— the only one who ever stirred Arnaut’s pulses. When he met her, he went mad. She became the main reason for his existence from that instant And because she was the one woman, Arnaut, I think, became insanely jealous of her. Not that there was any reason for it, really, but that he fancied all other men must look upon her with his eyes. It was not that he did not trust her. She was a good woman, chief. It was just that he felt as the wearer of a priceless jewel may feel, when he knows that others envy him its possession. It was a sort of possessive fear that Arnaut felt. That, of course, was— at first.

“Arnaut, chief, is a peculiar man. Despite all his mad passion for his wife he gave little sign of what he felt. He is one of those men whose inner emotions do not easily disturb his surface. So while his love burned at a white heat within him, he was not given to outward manifestations of affection. He sought rather to act than to talk his love, to show what he felt by giving her everything she wanted, gratifying her every desire. His greatest delight was to find something he knew she wished and bring it to her. His love was a shrine at which he worshiped, and his wife was the madonna in that shrine. That, chief, is how Arnaut loved.”

“You must have known him very well, to know so much,” the chief suggested.

“I did. I was closer to him than any other, chief.”

“But—what are you leading up to?”

The chief’s cigar had gone out. He laid it aside.

“To what happened last night, and— the cause.”

The chief leaned back in his chair.

“All right. Go on.”

“Arnaut had a friend, chief. His name was Paul Leiss. They had been boys together. They had gone to school together, and in later years they remained bosom friends. Leiss was a single man. But after his marriage Amaut took him to his house and presented him to his wife. What foul fiend of evil laughed at the step, only the powers which laugh at us mortals can know. Yet for a long time, everything remained as it had been. Paul was frequently at the house, and often when Jean was out of town, he escorted Mrs. Arnaut to places of amusement or to social functions. He and she became very good friends.

“It was then that Jean’s jealousy began to manifest itself, chief. He watched the growing intimacy between them with a smiling face that none the less masked the first stirrings of suspicion. Remember that he was a man of the world, and knew of other instances of a friend’s forgetting his honor. One may say that his love and primal faith in his wife should have sustained him, but we—you and I— of the world, chief, also— know that jealousy is an insidious thing which feeds on little. Jean Arnaut became suspicious of his friend first, and then of his wife. In such a man, if the fire of love is hot, the fire of jealous doubt is as the flame of hell itself.

“Yet so far as I know, no one suspected. There was no reason why anyone should. It was there that the man’s ability of repression showed itself. He still met Paul as always. He still treated his wife as he had treated her from the first. But he was watching— watching. Never an instant, when he was with them, but that his eyes were seeking a covert meaning in a glance, his ears listening for a veiled suggestion in a phrase. With the stealth of a prowling animal he kept his gnawing secret concealed, by a smile, and— watched. He even found a terrible pleasure in watching; in thinking that all the time they fancied him blind, he was looking on from what amounted to a screen. I am not saying that he was not warped in his judgment. He was. His jealousy of the beautiful woman he had married perverted his sense of proportion until every act, every word, took on a double meaning to his morbid fancy. But he thought then, sincerely, that he was justified in his suspicions. So— the result is as you see.”

“You knew of this insane jealousy?” the chief inquired.

“Oh yes!”

His visitor inclined his head.

“And let it go on— made no effort to stop it?”

“On the contrary, chief. I have labored with Jean for hours. He could see nothing save his suspicions— would consider nothing else.”

“Go on,” the chief prompted.

“One day Arnaut came home from a trip. That evening his wife related to him her life in the interval he had been absent. She spoke of Leiss again and again. Suddenly Arnaut turned upon her. He was drunk with rage.

“ ‘You care more for him than for me!’ ” he cried.

“She laughed. He pressed for an answer. After a time she resented his attitude. She told him that his question was an insult, which she would answer by refusing to discuss the matter further. You see she had pride.

“The episode, however, was but the pouring of oil on the fire of Arnaut’s suspicion. Prom that instant he began planning a trap for the two, that he might face them in the perfidy he was now convinced was theirs. And yet— so wonderful was his craft, which amounted to insane guile— he was still outwardly much the same, gave no definite sign of the terrible thing in his soul. Only when alone did he pace the floor, grimacing, mouthing, swearing terrible oaths, till a froth gathered on his lips, and his eyes were bloodshot, and his tongue hot with fearful words.

“He laid his trap. It was nothing new. Merely he announced a journey— and on the night when he was supposed to be leaving the city he dined with Mrs. Arnaut. Never had she appeared more desirable, more alluring, more a thing to be adored. But he hardened his heart to his purpose and after dinner he went with her to her boudoir and sat in a chair by a little table, while he smoked a cigar.

“ ‘Paul coming tonight?’ ” he asked, watching her through a half veil of smoke.

“ ‘Not that I know of,’ ” she told him. She was in a soft negligee— plainly dressed for an evening at home.

“It should have meant nothing to Jean. Paul often came in unexpectedly, as he knew. But this time he had kept all mention of his projected trip from his friend, because he wanted to feel sure of the woman’s guilt—that she called her lover to him, after he himself had gone. Hence into her words he read evasion. He nodded, got up and bade her good-bye. He left the house, saying he was going to his office for some papers and then to his train.

“In reality he never went beyond the end of the block. There he stopped. Crouched in the shadow of a railing, he watched his house.

“After a time a figure came down the street, and a man ran up the steps. Arnaut recognized the figure and carriage of his friend, Paul.

“For what seemed a long time after that, he still crouched where he was, nursing the terrible thing in his brain. Yet he kept sufficient control to adhere to the plan he had made. He meant to give them time to feel sure of his absence. At length he stepped out of the shadow and walked to the house, went up the steps and entered with his night key.

“His wife and Paul were sitting in the drawing room as he came in. Even then he noticed how beautiful she was. The next instant, however, his contempt for her treachery came back in a burning flood to his soul. He strode into the room and paused.

“ ‘Jean!’ his wife cried out.

"Perhaps she was merely surprized. Perhaps for the first time some of Arnaut’s control relaxed, and she saw something of his inner state peering at her from his burning eyes. Jean doesn’t know, and he never will learn— now.

“Leiss rose. ‘Hullo,’ he said. ‘We thought you’d left town, old man.’

“By an effort Arnaut steadied his voice. He explained that he had missed his train.”

“Hold on!”

The chief leaned suddenly forward. “See here— if you know that, you must have seen Amaut since the murder.”

His informant's tone was matter of fact

“Then—you know where he is now?”

“Yes. That is what caused me to spend a sleepless night— at least in part. I was trying to decide what to do about Arnaut.”

"There is only one thing you can do.” The chief’s finger crept toward a button on his desk. “Tell me where he is at once.”

“He will not escape.” His visitor raised a hand. “Wait but a minute longer, chief, till my story’s done. Arnaut left his wife with Leiss. He made an excuse of going to his room. But instead of doing so he went hastily to his wife’s boudoir and began a search for any sign which might indicate his friend’s prior presence in the room. He found it! On a little table which held his wife’s basket of fancy work— she had a pretty taste, was always making pretty things— he found a white pile of tobacco ashes, staring up at him from the darkly polished wood—proof that a man had been admitted not so long before.

“His lips writhed for a moment, baring his teeth like the fangs of a wolf. He fairly ran to his own apartments, dragged out a drawer and procured a weapon. With it he returned to the drawing room. His mind was made up. He was going to kill Leiss. But first he meant to tell them both how he had watched, watched, watched, for months.

“Leiss was on his feet when he entered the room for the second time. He spoke as Arnaut appeared.

“ ‘I was just leaving, Jean. I only ran in for a moment on my way to the Greenville reception. I must be getting on.’

“ ‘Wait I want a word with you.’

“Arnaut held up his hand And then, like a man slipping the leash of a savage dog, he relaxed all the restraint which had held him. All his foul suspicions, all his fancied proof, all his agony of soul, all his love for his wife and his friend turned to hatred, he poured out upon them in a wild flood of rage and despair.

"In the midst of it, Leiss sought with a face of horror to stay him.

“ ‘Jean! Jean— you are mad to talk like this,’ he cried. ‘Stop! I will not permit even you to insult the woman who is your wife, in such fashion. If you were anyone save my old friend, I would strike you down for a great deal less. You—’

“Amaut turned upon him with a frightful imprecation. He cursed him and he cursed his wife. And suddenly drawing his weapon, he shot Leiss through the chest, so that he staggered and fell upon the floor. And at that he laughed, and turned on his wife, who had screamed and was cowering back beyond the body.

“‘There!’ he shrieked at her, pointing to it. ‘There is the thing you loved! Look at it and see how lovable it is—now!’

“ ‘Oh—my God!’ said his wife. ‘You believe that— really believe?’

“And she stretched out her hands like one groping in darkness and swayed on her feet.

“Arnaut answered her with a string of accusing oaths. But she was brave—brave. Amaut admits that. Suddenly she drew herself up. She was very pale, and her eyes were wide. But her words lashed back at him in scorching scorn.

“ ‘Then—why don’t you complete your work?’

“Arnaut says she stretched out her arms. He says her eyes, her face, will haunt him to the grave. But then he was mad—utterly mad. He lifted his smoking weapon and pointed it at her, and with what seemed to him then as absolute deliberation he fired.

“She swayed before him for a moment, and a spot of red grew on the filmy fabric of her gown. Then, then she bent forward slightly and coughed. Red blood spattered from her lips. ‘Jean!’ she choked, and fell on her knees, on her face.

“Arnaut nodded. He was quite satisfied. He had made all his plans. Yet even as he put his weapon away, something made him stoop and lift her up in his arms, and lay her on the couch. Having done that he straightened her limbs and composed her hands. She was still warm, seemed scarcely more than asleep. Then he walked out of the room without a single backward glance, and turned off the lights at the switch.

“All his rage had left him. He decided to leave the city at once. Going to his room, he took up the bags he had packed earlier in the day and started to leave the house. As he passed the door of his wife’s boudoir, he noticed that the lights were burning. He set down his bags and stepped inside to turn them off. Then for the first time he saw what before had escaped his attention. It was a half-smoked cigar lying on the floor in the shadow of the table on the top of which he had seen the ashes. He crossed to it and picked it up. The band about it showed it to be one of the brand he habitually smoked.

“Suddenly, chief, as he stood there holding it in his hand, he began to tremble, because of a terrible thought. His supply of cigars was kept in his own room, in a cabinet to which he held the key, and which he always kept locked. He put down a finger slowly and touched the pile of ashes. They were cold— quite cold— but not more so than his own flesh had become. You see, chief, he had remembered— when it was too late. Now that it was all past— now that the terrible, irrevocable deed had been done, and two innocent souls sent to an unmerited fate— suddenly into his reeling brain came the recollection of the cigar he had smoked in that room before the pretended start on his journey. In that terrible moment which seared all the madness of suspicion from the soul of Jean Arnaut forever, I realized, chief, that the cigar and ashes were mine.”

The chief came to his feet in a bound.

“Mine,” the man with the sunken eyes reaffirmed. “I— God help me I— am Jean Arnaut.”

__________________

5: The Malignant Entity

Otis Adelbert Kline

1891-1946

Weird Tales May/Jun 1924

“I TELL you, Evans,” said Dr. Dorp, I banging his fist on the arm of his chair for emphasis, “the science of psychology is in much the same stage of development today as were the material sciences in the dark ages.”

“But surely,” I objected, “the two centuries of investigation just past have yielded some fruit. It cannot be that the eminent men who have devoted the greater part of their lives to this fascinating subject have labored in vain.”

The doctor stroked his iron-gray Van Dyke meditatively.

“With a few— a very few exceptions, I’m afraid they have,” he replied, “at least so far as their own deductions from observed phenomena are concerned.”

“Take Sir Oliver Lodge, for example—” I began.

“The conclusions of Sir Oliver will serve as an excellent example for my analogy,” said the doctor. “No doubt you are familiar with the results of his years of painstaking psychical research as expounded in his books.”

“I believe he has become a convert to spiritism,” I replied.

“With all due respect to Sir Oliver,” said the doctor, “I should say that he has rather singled out such facts as suited his purpose and assembled them as evidence to support the spiritistic theory. It may seem paradoxical to add that I believe he has always been thoroughly conscientious in his investigations and sincere in his deductions.”

“I’m afraid I do not quite follow you.”

“There are times in the life of every man, ” continued the doctor, “when emotion dethrones reason. At such a crisis the most keen-witted of scientists may be blinded to truth by the overpowering influence of his own desires. Sir Oliver lost a beloved son. Only those who have suffered similar losses can appreciate the keen anguish that followed his bereavement, or sympathize with his intense longing to communicate with Raymond. Most men are creatures of their desires. They believe what they want to believe. Under the circumstances it was not difficult for a clever psychic to read the mind of the scientist and tell him the things he wanted to hear.”

“But what of the many investigators who have not been similarly influenced?” I inquired. “Surely they must have found some basis— ”

I was interrupted by the entrance of the doctor’s housekeeper who announced—

“Beggin’ your pardon, sir, a gentleman to see your, sir.”

“Show him in,” he said rather petulantly.

His frown of annoyance changed to a welcoming smile of recognition at sight of the tall, bulky individual who strode through the doorway.

“How are you, Doc,” roared the big man as they shook hands cordially. “Haven’t bothered you for a long time, have I?  Got a case for you now that will make you put on your thinking cap all right.”

“Sounds interesting,” replied the doctor. “Let me present an old friend of mine, Mr. Evans, who writes a story every now and then when the spirit moves him. Mr. Evans, Chief McGraw of the detective bureau. We were just discussing our mutual hobby, psychic phenomena, when you came in,” he continued after we had acknowledged the introduction.

“No doubt Chief McGraw’s communication is Of a confidential nature—” I began, with the purpose of taking leave of my host.

“Nothing secret about it so far as Dr. Dorp and his friends are concerned,” interrupted the chief. “It may be that if you are a psychologist you can offer some Solution of the mystery. Of course, I don’t exactly know whether it’s a case for a psychologist or not. Damned curious thing, and ghastly, too.”

“Stay and listen if you are interested,” said the doctor.

“If it has any smattering of psychology or the occult, you know my failing,” I responded.

“Can’t say as to that,” said the chief. “It’s queer enough, though— and horrible. You gentlemen have heard of Professor Townsend, I presume.”

“You mean Albert Townsend, the chemist and inventor?” asked the doctor. “Assuredly. Who hasn’t heard of him and his queer theories about creating life from inert matter? What has he done now?”

“I don’t know whether it’s something he did or something that was done to him, but anyway he’s dead.”

“Murdered?”

“That’s the point I want you to help me clear up. I don’t know. His daughter ’phoned the office this morning and asked for me. When I got on the wire I could hardly understand her, she was so hysterical. Sobbed out something about her father being gone and a human skeleton lying on the floor of his laboratory. I jumped in the car and took Hirsch, the finger print expert out there with me. We found the frightened girl weeping in the arms of a motherly neighbor, who informed us that the laboratory was on the second floor.

“The whitened skeleton of Professor Townsend, fully clothed in garments that hung like rags on a scarecrow, lay on the floor of the laboratory.”

“You made sure, of course, that it really was the skeleton of the professor.”

“Beyond the least shadow of doubt. In the first place it was clothed in the professor’s garments. His watch with his name in the back was ticking in the vest pocket. His monogrammed ring, a present from his daughter, circled a bony finger. On the bones of the right forearm were the marks of a fracture that had healed and the skull was slightly indented, above the right temple. These marks resulted from an automobile accident in which the professor was injured two years ago. To make assurance doubly sure, we called in his dentist who readily identified his own work on the teeth.”

“When was the professor last seen alive?”

“That is the feature that makes the affair so uncanny. He was alive, and apparently normal, mentally and physically, at dinner last evening.”

“Most amazing!” exclaimed Dr. Dorp. “Suppose we go out—”

“Just what I was going to suggest,” replied The chief. “My car is standing outside. Would you care to accompany us, Mr. Evans?”

“He would perish from curiosity if he couldn’t see the thing through now,” said the doctor when I hesitated. “Come along with us, old man. If two minds are better than one, then surely three minds are superior to two.”

We piled in the chief’s roomy roadster and were soon speeding toward the house of mystery.

ii

PRESENTLY the car stopped before a two story brick house. Its upper windows, with shades half drawn, appeared to stare down at us with a look of sly cunning as if endeavoring to conceal some fearful secret.

A short, chunky individual, smooth faced and with a decidedly florid complexion, met us at the door. Chief McGraw introduced him as Hirsch, the finger print expert.

“All alone, Hirsch?” asked the chief, looking about as we entered the spacious living room.

“Might as well be,” replied Hirsch. “Miss Townsend is in her room with a neighbor. The cook and housemaid are out in the kitchen, scared green.”

“Coroner been here?”

“No. He called me up about twenty minutes ago and said he had an inquest to attend to on the south side. Told me he didn’t know how soon he could get here, but it would be several hours, at least.”

“How about the prints?”

“All the finger prints in the laboratory seem to have been made by the same person, evidently the professor.”

“Hum. Better ’phone headquarters right away and have them send Rooney out. He might come in handy to guard the death room in case the coroner is late.”

“All right sir. I’ll call up right away.”

“Now gentlemen,” said the chief, turning to the doctor and me, “let us go upstairs.”

We followed him up the thickly carpeted stairway and along a broad corridor at the end of which he opened a door.

I started involuntarily at sight of the grinning, ghastly thing that lay on the floor. Not so Dr. Dorp. He knelt beside it and examined it minutely, his keen gray eyes alert for every detail. He even touched his fingers to the white forehead and prodded the shadowy depths of the empty eye sockets.

At length he rose and unshed his hands at the porcelain lavatory.

“It seems incredible,” he said, “that this man could have been alive yesterday.”

“Just what I was thinking,” responded the chief. “Those bones could not have been drier or whiter if they had bleached in the sunlight for the last ten years.”

The doctor now turned his attention to the contents of the laboratory. He examined the collection of retorts, test tubes, breakers, jars, dishes and other paraphernalia spread on a porcelain topped table set against the wall and reaching half the length of the room. The walls were shelved clear to the ceiling, and every shelf was crowded to its utmost capacity with bottles, jars and cans containing a multitude of chemicals. To these he gave but scant attention.

In the center of the immaculate white tile floor stood an open, glass-lined vat. From its height and diameter I estimated its capacity at about sixty gallons. This vat was more than a third full of a colorless, viscous liquid that gave off a queer, musty odor.

“What do you suppose that stuff is?” I asked Dr. Dorp.

“Looks like a heavy albuminous or gelatinous solution,” he said. “Possibly it is some special compound the professor employed in his experiments. Mediums of this nature are often used in the cultivation of colonies of bacteria and it is possible that he intended to use it as a carrier and food for the organisms it was his ambition to create synthetically.”

“Any idea what caused the death of the professor?” asked the chief.

“I have a theory,” replied Dr. Dorp, “but it seems so illogical, so wildly impossible, so— er, contrary to the teachings of science that I prefer to keep it to myself for the present, at least.”

A heavy tread sounded in the hallway and a moment later a blue-uniformed officer entered.

“Hello, Rooney,” greeted Chief McGraw. “I want you to see that no one disturbs this room or its contents until the coroner arrives. We are going downstairs now. Keep a weather eye on things and I’ll send a man to relieve you soon. If either of these gentlemen want to come in at any time you may admit them.”

“Yis, sor. I’ll remember them.”

We trooped downstairs. Two women were seated in the living room. Chief McGraw presented us to the younger, who proved to be the professor’s daughter, Dorothy Townsend. She was a slender girl about twenty years of age with pale, regular features and a wealth of gold-brown hair. Her large, expressive eyes were red with recent weeping and her lips quivered slightly as she bowed to us in turn and introduced us. to the stout, middle-aged neighbor, Mrs. Harms, who had been endeavoring to comfort her.

“Hirsch and I are going to run down to headquarters for a couple of hours,” said the chief. “Would you prefer to come with us or stay here and look around?”

“I think we had better look around a bit if you don’t mind,” replied the doctor.

“All right. I’m going to send a man to relieve Rooney at six. Will be along myself a little later. If you discover anything new call me up.”

When the two men were gone the doctor bowed before Miss Townsend.

“May I have a few words with you in private?” he asked.

“Certainly,” she replied, rising, “in Father’s study if you wish.”

They entered the study, which was directly off the living room, and closed the door. They must have been gone about a half hour, but it seemed like two hours to me as, fidgeting inwardly, I listened to Mrs. Harms’ family history, her account of the death of her beloved husband, and minute descriptions of six operations she had undergone, each time, to use her own expression, “standing at the entrance of death’s door.” She assured me, also, that she knew what it was to have death in the home. The Grim Reaper had visited her family a score of times, she averred, and only three weeks before, one of her roomers had been found dead in bed.

She prattled on with scarce a pause until the door of the study opened. I was glad when she went upstairs with Miss Townsend and left Dr. Dorp and me together.

“Come into the study,” he said. “I have learned some interesting things, and it is possible that more await us in here.”

Professor Townsend’s study was neither large nor pretentious. It was obviously the retreat of a profound student as attested by the book-lined walls, many of the volumes of which were worn with much handling. The furniture consisted of a large, roll-top desk, a smaller typewriter desk on which stood a hooded machine, a filing cabinet, two office chairs and three comfortable overstuffed chairs, one beside the window, the other two placed conveniently under wall lights for reading.

A thick pile of typewritten manuscripts lay on the roll-top desk. The doctor divided them, handing me half and settling himself comfortably in one of the overstuffed chairs with the other half.

“Miss Townsend kindly brought these out of the files for me," explained the doctor. “I think it possible that they may shed some light on the mysterious cause of the death of their author. We can save time by dividing the work.”

“I believe I can conduct a more intelligent search if you will give me Some idea of what I am to look for,” I said.

“Quite so,” he agreed. “I had forgotten for the moment that you were not familiar with the details of my interview with Miss Townsend. Let me review it briefly.

"She finished school nearly a year ago, and since that time has been acting as her father’s secretary, typing his manuscripts and attending to, much of his voluminous correspondence.

“He has been working day and night in his effort to prove his theory that a living organism can be created from inorganic matter. During their months of close association she found him extremely irritable until one morning about three weeks ago. It appeared that his very nature had changed over night and she assumed that he had made some important discovery. She remembers the exact date owing to the fact that Mrs. Harms’ roomer was found dead in bed on the night of the supposed discovery. This roomer, who was living under an alias, was found to be a notorious character known as Immune Benny, and is alleged to have committed numerous crimes, among which were several revolting murders, without ever having been convicted.

“After that night the professor’s jubilant attitude kept up until his death. He paid no attention to his correspondence or manuscripts and spent the greater part of his time in his laboratory, presumably experimenting with numerous live animals which he had delivered each day. His first experiments, she stated, were with mice, rats and guinea pigs. He next used cats, rabbits and small dogs, then larger dogs until, on the day before his death he had two huge mastiffs brought to the house and took them into the laboratory. None of the animals taken behind that door ever reappeared, and she quite naturally assumed that they had been the subjects of vivisection. My theory, however, is that he—”

The doctor was interrupted by a loud rap at the study door. He rose and opened it, revealing a sturdy uniformed policeman. A frightened housemaid peered around his huge bulk. The man seemed greatly perturbed. His voice shook as he asked—

“Where’s Rooney?”

“He’s on guard in the laboratory,” replied the doctor. “Are you the man sent to relieve him?”

“I’m Officer Burke. The maid, here, showed me to the laboratory, but Rooney ain’t there. It’s a horrible place. Don’t blame him for leavin’."

“Yes. That skeleton on the floor isn’t exactly pretty.”

“That skeleton? You mean them skeletons. There was two of them, and one was dressed in a cop’s uniform!”

With an exclamation of surprise and horror, the doctor threw down the manuscripts he was holding and rushed for the stairway. I followed breathlessly.

iii

WHAT we saw in that awful room of death confirmed our wildest fears. A skeleton, with the bones whitened like those of the professor, lay on the floor facing the doorway. One bony arm was stretched across the threshold as if its owner had been attempting to drag himself from the room when struck down. A blue uniform bagged loosely over the bones, and on the feet were the heavy, hobnailed, square-toed shoes I had noticed on Rooney’s feet some time before.

The doctor squinted at the star on the breast of the recumbent figure. Then he turned to Officer Burke who had come up behind us.

“What Was Rooney’s number?” he asked.

“942.”

“Then this is Rooney’s uniform and it probably is his skeleton. Call up the chief and tell him what happened. This is horrible— diabolical!"

“Your theory,” I said, “does this shed any new light on it?”

“On the contrary,” he replied, “it makes the case more baffling than ever. It seems incredible that such things can really happen. I tell you, Evans, there is some mysterious force at work here— something new and unheard of in the annals of scientific research. It is my opinion that the late Professor Townsend chanced upon some force hitherto unknown to scientists and played with it like a little child with fire until it suddenly destroyed him. The death of Officer Rooney is ample proof that this terrible force, whatever it may be, survived him.

“Now let us conjecture regarding the nature of this thing that has taken the lives of two human beings. We know that the professor’s chief ambition was to create life from inert matter. All of his experiments in the laboratory were made with this object in view. All his printed works show plainly his firm belief that the thing could be accomplished, some of them going so far as to point out the processes by which he believed protoplasm, the primitive basic life substance, might be analyzed. As protoplasm is a compound of almost unlimited complexity in its physical and chemical constitution, our most skilled chemists have been unable to unravel its secrets. In fact, the further a chemist gets in his attempts at analysis the more baffling and complex he finds it to be. Being a compound composed of complex substances which are in turn composed of others still more complex, and so on, ad infinitum, its secrets are fully as inscrutable as those of the starry universe.

“The professor’s first step, therefore, in this seemingly impossible undertaking, would be to analyze protoplasm. Assuming that he succeeded in reducing it to its basic elements his next problem would be to take similar elements and, through a process even more complex than the previous one, assemble and reassemble them until they were capable of sustaining life.

“Let us suppose that he did these things. Let us assume that he has succeeded in creating protoplasm. What next? We will say that he has taken some primitive form of life for a pattern, a moneron, perhaps, the most simple type of animal, consisting, of a single cell of protoplasm. There still exists a difference between the moneron and the synthetically created cell. Chemically and physically they are the same, but the moneron is alive.

"What is life? Broadly defined as we recognize it on this earth, it is a temporary union of mind and matter. There may be, and probably is another kind of life which is simply mind without matter, but we of the material world know it not. To us, mind without matter or matter without mind are equally dead. The moneron has a mind— a soul— a something that makes it a living individual. Call it what you will. The professor’s cell of man-made protoplasm has not. Can you conceive of any possible way in which he could, having reached this stage, create an individual mind or soul, an essence of life that, once united with his cell of protoplasm would form an entity?"

"It seems impossible," I admitted.

“So it seems," he replied, “yet it is only on such an hypothesis that I can account for the mysterious deaths of the professor and Officer Rooney.”

“But I don’t see how a moneron or a creature remotely resembling one could kill and completely devour a man in less than two hours,” I objected.

"Nor I," agreed the doctor. "In fact I am of the opinion that, if the professor did succeed in creating life, the result was unlike any creature large or small, now inhabiting the earth— a hideous monster, perhaps, with undreamed of powers and possibilities— an alien organism among billions of other organisms, 'hating them all because it has nothing in common with them— a malignant entity governed solely by the primitive desire for food and growth with only hatred of and envy for the more fortunate natural creatures around it."

“If the professor did succeed in creating or discovering such a creature,” I said, “it is evidently in this house at this very moment. Unless it has the faculty of making itself invisible a thorough search should reveal its whereabouts, for having consumed two men it must be a monster of no mean proportions.”

“That is true,” replied the doctor, “however, we have another hypothesis that is equally worthy of our consideration if we accept the premise that the professor created a living creature. Judging from his writings he spent a considerable portion of his time studying and experimenting in microbiology. Suppose he succeeded in creating a microscopic organism, and that organism had the power to reproduce its kind. If it reproduced by fission, that is, by simply dividing itself after it had attained a certain size, the only check to its increase would be death or lack of food. The more food it could obtain that much more rapidly would it and its descendants multiply. Countless billions of such creatures might occupy this room and yet be invisible without the aid of a compound microscope. There is ample room for a swarm of such creatures numerous enough to devour a man to float in the air above our heads without revealing its presence.”

The words of the doctor affected me strangely. Involuntarily I looked upward, half expecting a swarm of man-eating microbes to descend and devour me. For a moment I was seized with a feeling of panic so strong I could scarcely restrain myself from leaping for the door. The fact that the sun had just set and dusky shadows were thickening in- the room augmented the illusion. I crossed the floor nervously and pressed the switch beside the door. Instantly the place was flooded with blue-white light from a cluster of powerful globes depending from the middle of the ceiling.

As I was crossing the room my eyes fell on the contents of the glass-lined tank. I stared unbelievingly for a moment, then called Dr. Dorp.

“What is it, Evans?” he asked.

“The liquid in this tank,” I replied. “It has changed color. Something has turned it pink. ”

“The effect of the artificial light, no doubt,” he said, coming up beside me. Then I saw the expression of doubt on his face change to one of surprise and wonder.

“You are right,” he exclaimed. “It has not only changed color but a still more remarkable transformation has taken place. When we noticed it this afternoon, the tank was a third full of the colorless liquid. This pink fluid reaches half way to the top!”

iv

THE tread of many feet sounded in the hall.

Chief McGraw paused in the doorway, staring down at the blue-clad skeleton on the floor, a look of horror on his face. Behind him were four policemen in uniform.

“Is— is that the skeleton of poor old Rooney?” he asked.

“I’m afraid it is,” replied Dr. Dorp.

The chief knelt and examined the star on the bagging blue coat.

“It’s hellish, positively hellish," he said, rising, "Do you know what killed him?”

“We are working on a theory—" began the doctor, but was interrupted by the chief.

“Theories be damned!” he snapped. "Work on your theories if you want to. This thing has gone top far. I’m going to get some facts.” He swung on the four men behind him. “Search the house,” he said. “Look sharp for anything of a suspicious nature. An infernal machine, perhaps, or a blood sucking animal. There is a man-killer of some kind, human or otherwise, hidden in this house, and it’s our business to find it.”

When the men had departed he stepped over Rooney’s skeleton.

“I’ll search this room myself,” he said.

He did, with professional thoroughness, looking for hidden panels and sounding the walls, both in the open areas and behind the shelves, for hollow spaces. Then he began opening the drawers in a tall cabinet that stood in one comer, disclosing surgical and dissecting instruments of various kinds, an indexed set of microscope slides with some extra lenses, platinum dishes, porcelain drying pans, crucibles, glass rods and tubing, pipettes, rubber tubing and stoppers, rubber gloves and aprons, and other miscellaneous laboratory paraphernalia.

The bottom drawer of the cabinet was quite large and deep. The chief cried out excitedly when he saw its contents.

“Good Lord! Look at that!” he exclaimed.

It was filled to the top with dry, white bones.

“Nothing but the bones of small animals,” said Dr. Dorp, picking up a skull. “This, for instance, is the skull of a dog.” Then, taking up another: “Here is the skull of a rabbit. Notice the characteristic chisel-shaped teeth. This one beside it once supported the bewhiskered countenance of a common house cat.”

“What do you suppose he was doing with them?” asked the chief.

“It is my belief that they were brought here to be killed and devoured by the same thing that killed the professor and Rooney.”

“And that thing is—”

“At present, merely a shadowy theory, although it most certainly has an existence. There is a power in this house that is a menace to everyone under this roof— a malignant entity that destroys human beings in some mysterious manner unparalleled in the annals of science or human experience. This much we know, reasoning from effects. Reasoning from possible causes we are aware that the hobby of Professor Townsend was the endeavor to create a living thing from inorganic matter, and putting the two together it seems to me that the logical hypothesis would be that he either succeeded in creating a monster of a sort unknown to biologists, or discovered and developed unheard of powers and habits in a creature already known.”

“If there’s such a thing in this house, believe me I’m going to find it," said the chief, stamping out of the room.

"Now that we have a few moments to ourselves,” said Dr. Dorp when McGraw had departed, “let us conduct a search, or rather an inquiry on our own account. I perceive that we have a very excellent compound microscope at our disposal and am curious to examine the liquid which has so mysteriously risen and changed color in the tank.”

He took a blank slide from the cabinet drawer and a small glass rod from the table. As he was about to dip the rod in the liquid he uttered a low exclamation of surprise.

“What’s up now?” I asked.

“This amazing liquid has again become transparent,” he replied. “The red tint is gone."

He plunged the tip of the rod into the viscous liquid, twisted it slightly and withdrew it. Although the liquid seemed quite heavy it slipped from the end of the rod much after the manner of the white of an egg. After considerable juggling lie succeeded in obtaining a small amount which he smeared on the slide. He then placed the slide in position and adjusted the microscope with a practiced hand.

“Well,” I asked, after he had peered into the eyepiece for a full ten minutes, “what is the stuff, anyway?”

“Here, look for yourself,” he replied.

What I saw in the field of the microscope appeared to be a mesh work or foam work of exceedingly fine bubbles or perhaps globules. Granules of different sizes and shapes seemed imbedded in these globules and the whole was dotted at intervals with small white objects. While I watched several of these white objects seemed to dissolve and disappear. All of them apparently were endowed with life, for I noticed that they expanded or contracted spasmodically and seemed endeavoring to push their way through the surrounding bubbles.

“Seems to be a sort of foam,” I said, "with something alive floating in it."

“The foam, as you call it, bears a singular resemblance to the basic life principle, protoplasm, when seen under the microscope,” replied the doctor.

“But those white things—” I began.

"The white things," he went on, “are the living remnants of a complex organism that has been destroyed. They are waging an unequal and hopeless battle against assimilation by the globules that surround them. These faithful guardians of the organism when alive still fight, and will continue to fight the enemy until, figuratively speaking, the last man falls.”

“But what are they?” I demanded.

“Unless I am very much mistaken." he replied, “they are—”

His answer was cut short by the appearance of Chief McGraw.

“Coroner and jury are downstairs," he said tersely. “I suppose they’ll want your testimony. I’ll leave a couple of men on guard here if you want to come down.”

"Let us go down to the study and complete our perusal of the professor’s manuscripts while the jury is in session,” said the doctor. “We can thus save considerable time and will be on hand when they are ready to question us.”

We met Coroner Haynes and his jurors at the foot of the stairs. They were about to go up for an inspection of the laboratory and its gruesome contents.

Dr. Dorp switched on one of the reading lamps and closed the door. Then he established himself in a comfortable chair with a pile of manuscripts and I followed his example. We found essays and articles on almost every subject pertaining to the transmission or generation of life. There were papers on anatomy, bacteriology, cell-structure, microbiology and embryology. There were treatises on evolution, spontaneous generation, and the structures and habits of micro-organisms. A forceful and extremely impressive essay set forth the astounding theory that all life was merely a form of force generated from matter. The reasoning was, of course, purely analogical. The professor’s contention, stated briefly, was that just as electricity, a force that is invisible and indefinable, is generated by the friction of particles of certain kinds of matter, so life is generated and springs into being when certain other types of matter come together in the right proportions and combinations.

"What is your opinion of this theory?” I asked Dr. Dorp.

"It is most cleverly put, but false because based on the false premise of the materialists that there are but two things in the universe, matter and force. They do not recognize, the power that controls the force which moves the matter toward a fixed objective. That power is mind. Thus, to them, all life and all mind are merely forms of force generated originally from inert matter.”

"If the professor succeeded in creating a living thing from inert matter,” I said, "it seems to me that he has demonstrated his proposition.”

"Why?”

"Because he was experimenting with dead matter and not with mind or living creatures. There would be no mind or soul involved to inherit its being from a parent mind or soul. A new life entity would be generated, as it were, from matter which formerly contained no life.”

“I think,” said the doctor quietly, "you would have stated the proposition more accurately had you said that a life entity— a mind without a body— had been induced to enter the body synthetically created.”

Our discourse was interrupted by Chief McGraw, who informed us that we were wanted by the coroner.

v

DR. DORP did the talking before the coroner’s jury. All the way through his testimony was negative. When asked if he had any idea what killed the professor and the policeman he replied that he had several ideas, but none of them would be worth bringing before the jury without more facts to substantiate them. I could sep that his purpose was to get the inquest over with as soon as possible so we might continue the investigation.

After due deliberation a verdict of “Death from cause or causes unknown," was brought in and the coroner departed with his men.

"Now that the inquest is over, what do you suggest?” McGraw asked the doctor.

"My suggestion is that we immediately destroy the liquid in the glass-lined tank in the laboratory.”

"Why?”

"Because I am convinced that it is at least one of the causes of the deaths that have taken place in this house.”

"I suppose you have a good reason for your assumption.”

"An excellent one, I believe. While you and your men were searching the house, Mr. Evans and I conducted a little investigation of our own. We put some of the liquid under the compound microscope and as we both saw the same things I am convinced that my eyes did not deceive me. Tell the chief what you saw, Evans.”

I described the foam work, the granules and the white objects which appeared to be alive and struggling to escape.

"All Greek to me,” said the chief. "What was it?”

"The foam work with its accompanying granules closely resembled protoplasm, the basic life substance.”

"And the white things—”

"Were white blood corpuscles from the veins of a human being. They were the strongest of the human body cells to resist assimilation and consequently the last to succumb. The red corpuscles turned the liquid pink for a while but they had disappeared before we made our microscopic examination.”

"Good Lord, why didn’t you tell me this before?” demanded the chief. "Let’s go up and destroy the stuff now. Those two men up there might be killed any minute.”

We found the Two policemen unharmed and made our plans for the destruction of the substance in the tank. Several demijohns of acid stood under the table and the doctor selected one nearly full of sulphuric acid.

"Open the windows,” he ordered. "This is going to make a horrible stench.”

Then he removed the rubber stopper from the mouth of the demijohn and I helped him hoist it to the edge of the tank. The searing liquid struck the heavy fluid in the tank with a hissing sound and bored into it like hot water poured in a snow bank. The jelly-like mass quivered slightly, and pungent, nauseating fumes arose to torment our nostrils.

Then, suddenly, as if in terrible pain and awakened to the danger of its dissolution, the plasmic substance began to heave and billow toward the top of the tank with a movement suggestive of the writhing of a huge coiled serpent in its death agony. By directing the stream of acid at the various peaks that arose we endeavored to keep it all washed down to a common level. Then a dozen peaks rose simultaneously and I noticed that one was capped with a round ball in the center of which was a black spot.

"The nucleus!” cried the doctor excitedly, shifting the demijohn. "Pour it on the nucleus!”

We were too late. The thing upreared itself with amazing speed and lopped over the edge of the tank opposite us. We dropped the nearly-emptied demijohn into the tank and rushed around to intercept it, just in time to see the ball containing the black spot separate itself from the stringy mass by which it was suspended, drop to the floor and roll under the table.

An exciting chase of several minutes ensued. The thing darted, or rather, rolled from place to place with amazing rapidity. The tile floor was cracked in a dozen places by blows from the clubs of the two policemen who assisted us. At length we drove it into the corner beneath the lavatory and advanced in close formation. I had armed myself with a large spatula, the doctor gripped a heavy pestle, the two policemen had their clubs and the chief held his automatic pistol in readiness.

As we drew close we moved with extreme caution, our nerves taut, our weapons ready to strike when the thing should make its dash for liberty. We waited breathlessly, but no movement came from the comer. I prodded the space behind the water pipes with my spatula. Still no sign of the thing we were after. Then I peered behind them and saw the reason— a hole an inch in diameter in the tile floor, probably drilled in the wrong place by a careless plumber and left unfilled because it was out of sight.

When I pointed it out to Dr. Dorp he shook his head solemnly.

“The Malignant Entity has escaped,” he said. “No one in this house— in this community, even— is safe until it is captured or killed.”

"You don’t mean to tell me that little thing we were chasing around the room could kill anybody,” said the chief.

"I am not so sure that it could kill any one now that it has been reduced to the size of a golf ball, although the cytoplasm surrounding the nucleus evidently has the power of quickly dissolving and assimilating living tissues. Its growth, apparently, is only limited by the amount of food it can find.”

“Maybe we’d better get the women out of the house,” said the chief.

“The sooner, the better. I suggest also that you surround the place with men armed with shotguns. If that thing gets out and starts to grow I shudder to think of what may happen. Children will not be safe outside their own homes, and perhaps not even within them. Adults will be attacked as soon as the creature has attained sufficient size, and there is always the possibility that it may have the power to reproduce its kind. Organisms of this kind, as a rule, multiply with exceeding rapidity. Think of a thousand or perhaps a million such monsters roaming through the land. It is almost impossible to kill them because of the power we have just witnessed, of leaving the body, no matter how large it has grown, taking with it only enough cytoplasm to protect the nucleus and make a new start.”

We were all gasping from the fumes that came out of the tank, and glad to get out of the laboratory.

When all were assembled in the living room the chief phoned headquarters for men and shotguns while Dr. Dorp and I explained what we had found to Miss Townsend.

After we had described our adventure in detail, the doctor said:

“It seems strange that your father left no record of his experiments with the monster.”

“I feel quite sure that he left a record of some sort, though I have never seen it,” replied Miss Townsend.

“Have you any idea where it is?”

“Perhaps in his safe in the study.”

“I do not remember seeing a safe in the study.”

“Naturally. It is hidden. Come and I will show you where it is.”

We followed her into the study and she swung back one of the bookcases which was hung on concealed hinges, revealing a small wall safe.

“Would you mind opening it for us?” asked the doctor.

She turned the dial to number twelve, then pulled the lever. It did not move. She seemed surprised, set the dial more carefully and tried again with the same result.

“It’s no use, I guess,” she said. “The last number of the combination is twelve. He usually turned it back to one and then it was only necessary to turn it to twelve to open it. He must have locked it last night.”

“Don’t you know the combination?”

“No. Father was the only one who knew that.”

“I wonder if you would object to our blowing the safe,” he asked.

“Not if it will be of any assistance to you,” she replied.

Chief McGraw, who had just finished calling headquarters, came into the room.

“Think you can get us a safe-cracker tonight, Chief?” asked the doctor.

“Get you most anything you want. What’s in the safe?”

“We believe it contains some valuable information regarding the thing we were chasing a while ago.”

“I’ll get a man out here right away,” said McGraw, going once more to the phone.

Officer Burke escorted Miss Townsend, Mrs. Harms and the two servants to the Harms home, where they were to spend the night.

Shortly afterward there arrived twenty policemen armed with shotguns and carrying several dozen bulls-eye lanterns. They brought extra weapons which were distributed to all of us who remained in the house, the chief, the doctor, the four policemen and myself. Burke was to remain on guard next door.

A ring of lanterns was placed around the house and the twenty armed men were posted at intervals between them. We then divided our forces as follows: One policeman was placed on guard in the laboratory. Chief McGraw with another policeman patrolled the upper rooms and halls. The doctor and one policeman remained on the first floor and I, accompanied by a strapping young fellow named Black, who had recently been admitted to the force, did sentry duty in the basement.

vi

THE Townsend basement was divided into three rooms, each lighted rather dimly by the yellow rays from an incandescent globe suspended on a short drop-cord. The furnace room and coal bins were situated at the rear end. The middle compartment contained a miscellaneous assortment of boxes, barrels, garden tools, household tools, canned fruits, empty fruit jars, bottles, and what not. The front room was used as a laundry.

Officer Black and I searched each room thoroughly, using a flash light in the dark corners and moving everything that wasn’t fastened to the floor or walls. Several mice jumped out from behind boxes and barrels, but we saw no sign of the creature we were hunting.

We were peering behind the furnace when the sound of several loud squeaks came to us from the middle room.

With shotgun held in readiness, I moved stealthily toward the point from which the sound came. There, in the center of the floor almost under the yellow electric light bulb, I saw the fast disappearing body of a mouse under a mass of plasmic jelly.

My first impulse was to shoot, but on second thought, I decided to attempt to capture the thing alive if possible. Instructing Black to hold his weapon in readiness in. case I failed, I unscrewed the lid from a large empty fruit jar and walked softly toward the center of the floor. I held the jar in readiness, expecting the thing to spring away at my approach with its former lightning-like rapidity. To my surprise it lay almost motionless on the body of its victim. I could see streaks of bright red flowing through the jelly-like mass as the blood of the-mouse was drawn up for assimilation.

I clapped the mouth of the jar over the creature and still it made no effort to escape. Then, sliding a fire shovel which Black brought me, under the thing and its victim, I turned the jar right side up. It fell to the bottom of the receptacle, still clinging to the now formless mass that had once been a mouse and making no effort to escape. I put the lid in place and screwed it down tight.

“Now try to get away, you devil!” I cried, shaking the jar exultantly.

I almost dropped it a moment later as a muffled explosion jarred the building. Then I remembered Chief McGraw’s safe-cracker, and hurried upstairs.

When I reached the living room, Dr. Dorp was emerging from the study in a cloud of plaster dust. In his hand was a thick, loose-leaf book.

“I have it,” he called excitedly, waving the book. “The professor’s diary.”

“Don’t get fussed over such trifles,” I replied, waving the jar in return. “Look what I’ve got. Caught it alive, too.”

I put the jar on the table and he squinted at it for a moment. The blood-bloated monstrosity had separated its shapeless hulk from the whitened bones of its victim and was sluggishly crawling up the side of the glass.

“You caught it, sure enough,” he said. “I only hope it hasn’t any little sons or daughters wandering about.”

“I’ll keep the house under guard for a couple of days,” said Chief McGraw, who had come down to leant the result of the cracksman’s labors. “If there are any more of those things around they ought to show themselves by that time.”

The doctor drew a chair up to the table and eagerly scanned the pages of the diary while we watched the antics of the thing in the jar. It kept getting lighter colored all the time, and more lively. By the time the cytoplasm had become transparent it was racing around, contorting its body into all manner of shapes. Sometimes it was flat, sometimes oval, and sometimes round. At times it put forth pseudopods, sometimes elongating them until it resembled a small cuttle fish.

“September twenty-third was the night Immune Benny died wasn’t it, Chief?” asked the doctor.

“Right. Why?”

“Then this diary tallies with Miss Townsend’s testimony. Here is the professor’s entry made under that date.

September 23, Nearly Midnight.

Eureka! I have succeeded. I placed a tiny drop of syntheplasm on the slide tonight as l have done a thousand times before, and covered it until a weak, sterile solution of gelatine.

I watched it steadily for a half hour but nothing happened until, suddenly, I noticed a tiny black spot forming in its center. I am positive there were no animalculae either in the syntheplasm or the solution, yet no sooner had the black spot become readily distinguishable than my speck of syntheplasm began moving about as if searching for food. Evidently it cannot subsist on gelatine.

I next introduced a rhizopod into the solution. My animal slightly resembles it, but is larger and gets about much faster. I wanted to compare the two but the rhizopod was quickly devoured. Now I know what to feed it.

“It is growing late so I will not read, all the details to you,” continued the doctor. “Suffice to say that the professor discovered his synthetically created creature would feed on nothing but living creatures. He fed it so many microscopic animals the second day that it grew to a size visible to the naked eye. Then he fed it gnats, mosquitos, flies, beetles, and finally mice, when it became so large he was forced to transfer it from the small porcelain dish in which he kept it, to a much larger one.

“The thing grew at a prodigious rate of speed. Its growth seemed only limited by the amount of living creatures it was permitted to devour. At length he was compelled to keep it in the glass-lined tank which he had been using for the culture of infusoria. Its victims were thrown into the tank alive and were quickly killed by the monster. He noticed that it was sluggish while assimilating its food, but moved with cat-like quickness when hungry. Though it had no eyes it seemed to sense the approach of food in some way and, toward the last, stretched forth pseudopods and snatched the animals from his hands.

“Yesterday the professor led two mastiffs into the room. Hardly had he dosed the door of the laboratory before the monster was out of the tank. It killed and devoured the two big dogs in less than a half hour— then crawled back sluggishly into the tank to digest its meal. Thus ends the written record of the professor’s adventures with the Malignant Entity. His whitened bones on the floor of the laboratory are mute testimony of what occurred this morning.”

There was a moment of awed silence when the doctor finished his narrative. His eyes fell on the struggling thing in the glass jar.

“What are you going to do with it?” I asked.

“Come,” he said, taking up the jar and starting for the basement. “I will show you.”

The chief and I followed him down the basement stairs and into the furnace room. He opened the fire-door and tossed the jar on the glowing coals.

The thing raced about spasmodically for a moment in the intense heat, then fell huddled in the bottom of the jar. Suddenly, as if inflated from beneath, it puffed upward and outward, almost filling the receptacle in a shape that resembled a human head. I thought this only a figment of my imagination at first— blinked— and looked a second time. The face of a man stared back at me from behind the curved glass, eyes glowing with malevolent hatred and lips drawn back in a snarl that revealed crooked, yellow fangs. For a moment, only the vision held. The next instant the jar was empty of all save a tiny pile of white, flaky ash and the bones of the mouse.

Dr. Dorp shut the door suddenly and noisily.

“That face,” I exclaimed. “Did you see it also?”

“A queer distortion of the gas-inflated protoplasm,” he replied.

Chief McGraw seemed greatly perturbed. He drew a long black cigar from his pocket, lighted if and puffed nervously for a moment.

“Distortion, hell,” he muttered. “It was a perfect double far the face of Immune Benny!”

_________________________

6: The Demon of Tlaxpam

Otis Adelbert Kline

Weird Tales, Jan 1929

“A TABLE for wan, señor?  I ’ave ver’ ex’lent place where the señor can see those dance girl do—”

“No.”

Standing just within the doorway of Mexican Joe’s notorious cafe, Bart Leslie scarcely noticed the diminutive head waiter, bowing solicitously before him. Leisurely, yet with piercing intentness, his eyes swept the smoke-clouded room, hovering for a moment at each table. The contortions of a dancing girl in flaming costume, slender hands on lissom hips, mantilla flying, tiny feet keeping time with the throbbing music of a brownskinned orchestra, drew only a cursory glance from him.

“Per’aps the señor likes company. Yes? A table for two in a quiet corner, an’ I send you wan ver’ beautiful—”

“No! Where’s Mexican Joe?”

“Ees talk weeth some friend upstair. You weesh—?"

“Tell him Bart Leslie wants to see him, muy pronto! Sabe?"

“Si, señor. Gracias, señor.”

Deftly catching the silver dollar which Leslie had flipped to him, he sped away among the tables and hastily climbed the stairway which led to a gallery over the orchestra platform and thence to the gaming-rooms above.

Leslie rolled a cigarette, lighted it, and waited. Presently he took a tightly wadded slip of yellow paper from his vest pocket, unfolded it, and scanned the contents. It was a Western Union telegram, and the date was the day previous:

MR. BART LESLIE

BONITA

DO ME THE HONOR TO DINE WITH ME AT MEXICAN JOE’S TOMORROW EVENING AT EIGHT. I HAVE AN IMPORTANT COMMUNICATION.

HERNANDEZ

Leslie folded and pocketed the missive once more, then glanced at his watch. It showed five minutes past eight. Time and place were correct, but where was Hernandez? And which Hernandez? He had known two— one a vaquero formerly employed on the Bar-X Ranch, the other an excaptain of the Gila Men, a dread order of bandits, counterfeiters, kidnapers and murderers which he had helped to wipe out some time before.

His meditations were interrupted by the obsequious approach of the head waiter, followed by a short, wizened Mexican whose forehead was creased by a livid scar, and whom he instantly recognized as Mexican Joe.

The latter was effusive in his greeting.

“Ah, Señor Leslie, I am delight! I am honor, to ’ave the great Two-Gun Bart, the great Devil-Fighter, weeth us! Don Arturo ees wait for you een wan private alcove. Myself, I weel show you the way.”

Considering that this same wily Mexican had once tried to drug him for a few paltry dollars, Leslie imagined that he was anything but delighted by his presence.

“All right, Joe, lead on,” he said tersely. Then, loosening his two six-shooters in their holsters, both as a precaution and as a hint that he was prepared for treachery, Leslie followed the cafe proprietor between the tables and behind the orchestra platform to where a double row of curtained alcoves served as private dining-rooms for the more fastidious or secretive of the resort’s patrons.

Pausing before one of these, he gently called:

“Don Arturo.”

“Si?”

“Señor Leslie ees arrive.”

“Bueno!”

The curtains parted and a tall, handsome Mexican, resplendent in purple velvet liberally trimmed with silver braid and adorned with buttons of the same metal, appeared in the opening and held out a slim hand, on one finger of which a dazzling ruby sparkled.

“Buenas noches, Señor Leslie,” he greeted.

“May God give the same to you, Señor Capitan,” replied Leslie, instantly recognizing Hernandez as a former officer of the dreaded Gilas.

After the handshake they entered the booth and were seated at opposite sides of the narrow table.

"No longer am I a capitan, amigo," said Hernandez, taking a frost-covered cocktail-shaker from the table and rattling its contents. “Only plain Don Arturo Hernandez, a civilian in the employ of my government.”

“A decided improvement, I should say,” replied Leslie, “and judging from that go-to-hell outfit you’re wearing, you’re making it pay."

Hernandez smiled.

“Ees not so bad,” he replied, removing the top from the shaker. “I ’ave concoct wan dreenk which I ’ope you weel like. Those Manhattan an’ Bronchitis cocktails I don’ care for, an’ I know you don’ drink those tequila an’ mescal, so I meex a dreenk where we meet on common ground.”

He filled Leslie’s glass, then his own.

“To unending friendship, amigo,” he proposed.

Leslie bowed and drank the toast.

“A corking good Bacardi cocktail, if I’m a judge,” he said. “Common ground is right! If your communication is as pleasing as your cocktail, we’ll get along.”

“It ees from my government,” replied Hernandez, producing a large sealed envelope from his pocket, “an’ it may be explain ’ quite briefly, though the details are here.”

A waiter entered with the first course of the Mexican dinner accompanied by the usual plate of steaming tortillas. When he had departed Hernandez continued:

“My government was ver’ mooch impress’ by the way you clean out those Gila,” he said, “an’ such word has come to the capital of your prowess an’ exploit along the border that they ’ave send me to request your co-operation in a matter weeth which they are unable to cope.”

“Before you go any farther,” said Leslie, "I may as well tell you that I am still in the United States Secret Service, and all my time and efforts belong to my government.”

“That ees all arrange’, amigo, in advance. My government ’as already approach and receive permission from yours to use your service eef we can make the satisfactory arrangement weeth you. It ees for you alone to say, now.”

“I see. You believe in preparedness. Well, what’s the racket?”

“It ees wan ver’ dangerous beezness. Near a town call’ Tlaxpam many people die now, for two years—ver’ sudden, ver’ horrible death. They walk or ride along trail. All sudden, zeep! The head, she ees gone! Cut-off, sleeck like wan whistle! Horse come to town weeth headless body or weethout rider many time. Travelers find bloody corpse along the road weethout head. Others say they ’ave seen Satanas heemself lurking een the bushes. Wan péon heard a horrible laugh joost after a man was beheaded.

“Government send men to investigate. Zeep! They sometimes lose the head, too. They send the Rurales. Some Rurales also lose the head, but of thees murderer they can not find even wan track. Ees damn’ bad beezness, I tal you.”

“Sounds like a fairy-story to me.”

“Maybe, but if you find thees fairy for my government they weel gladly pay you twenty thousand pesos and all expenses.”

“Well. That sounds substantial enough. Let me see the papers. ”

Hernandez broke the seal of the envelope and handed him two documents. One was permission from the American officials for Leslie to spend sixty days in Mexico whenever he should elect to go. The other was from the Mexican government, commending his past unofficial services in ridding them of the Gilas, and offering him the reward mentioned by Hernandez. All expenses were to be paid regardless of whether or not he succeeded.

The Mexican watched him narrowly as he read and folded the last document.

“Ees all satisfy, amigo?” he asked.

“All Jake,” Leslie replied.

“You weel go?”

“Of course.”

"Caspita! I tol’ my government you’re not afraid of those devil heemself. Put heem there!”

Silently the two men shook hands across the table.

ii

“SON OF wan gun! You tromp my ten-spot weeth a queen, eh? How you like that, an’ that, an’ that? Pay me.”

“High, low, Jack. That’s plenty.”

Bart Leslie fished in his pocket for a moment, then brought forth a handful of change, part of which he tossed on the table before Hernandez. Then he looked out the window of the private car furnished by the Mexican government to facilitate their journey to Tlaxpam. "Ought to be there soon, hadn’t we?” he asked.

“Five minute more, maybe. Wan more hand?”

“No thanks. Have to be getting my things together."

Walking unsteadily to his sleeping compartment, for the car lurched violently at every step, he closed and strapped his bag and handed it to the porter. Hernandez followed after gathering up the cards, and together they made their way to the platform.

“So this is Tlaxpam!”

Leslie looked out over a small group of sun-baked adobe buildings, then clutched the rail as the train halted with a jerk. He observed that the streets were deserted and remembered that it was the lazy hour of the siesta. Even the dogs slept.

“Eees the end of wan journey— the beginning of another. Follow me, amigo.”

Hernandez stepped down from the platform and led the way around the comer of the station, the porter following with their bags. Here a driver slept peacefully behind the wheel of an ancient and badly battered touring-car.

Hernandez shook him awake.

“Alerta, hombre!” he roared. “Mil demonios! Did I hire you to sleep for me?”

The man awoke, then took their bags from the grinning porter.

“Pardon, Don Arturo. I did not hear the train arrive.”

“You sleep like an ox. Be off, then. You have your orders. ”

After considerable persuasion with crank and primer, the engine started noisily, and they rattled off down a narrow, dusty street. Presently they stopped before one of the larger adobe houses, the door of which was opened by a dark-skinned mozo as soon as they had stepped down from the tonneau.

After a bath, and a meal served by the same dusky servant, Leslie and Hernandez entered the patio to enjoy their cigars, and found comparative coolness on a bench beneath the spreading branches of a huge pecan tree.

“And now, señor,” inquired Hernandez, politely, “how soon will you be willing to start on thees dangerous beezness?”

“Start? I have already started. What I want to do is to continue, and the sooner the better.”

The Mexican puffed reflectively for a moment.

“You Americans are so eempetuous. Maybe you ’ave not notice something, eh? I breeng you here during the hour of the siesta. I speak not your name, but call you only ‘amigo’ een front of my mozos. For why? Thees fairy, as you call heem, may ’ave the spy any place. Een my very house! Eef he know you are here you are mark for death before you start. Sabe?”

“I see. You want me at least to get one chance at him before he bumps me off. But what makes you think he has spies?”

“Those other come. Zeep! They lose the head too damn’ queek. I don’ like. They come weeth beeg noise and brag muy mucho. You come weethout noise and maybe do something. When they come everybody know. When you come, only I know. Ees not bad idea, eh?”

“Excellent logic, I should say. In any event it would be taking needless chances to herald my coming and my errand. But how and when do I start after your friend ? 'Ogre’ would perhaps be a better name."

“Tonight at midnight. Between now and that time you weel get all the rest and sleep you can. At twelve I weel ’ave a guide and horses to take you into the danger zone. Twelve picked men, armed to the teeth and carrying provisions and equipment, weel follow a half-mile behind you. They weel rush to your aid at the sound of a shot, and weel be subject to your command at all times! I ’ave arrange weeth a friend to quarter you een case you find it necessary to make camp. And now, amigo, weel you ’ave a leetle siesta before dinner?”

Bart Leslie tossed his cigar butt into the shrubbery, stretched his powerful arms, and grinned.

“That’s the best thing you’ve said today,” he replied.

iii

FROM some near-by tower a bell tolled the hour of eleven.

Leslie, who had retired immediately after dinner, was aroused from a sound slumber. He pushed back the covers and sat up in bed, trying to think what it was that had awakened him. Then the sound was repeated— a gentle tapping at his door.

Whipping one of his guns from the holster that swung from the belt on the chair beside him, he rose and tiptoed to the door.

“Que gente?” he asked. “Who is it?”

“Open, amigo,” came back the soft reply. "Ees Hernandez."

“Ahead of your schedule, aren’t you?"asked Leslie as he swung the door back.

To his surprize, there was no one in sight. About to step out into the dark hallway, he suddenly changed his mind as the sound of subdued breathing came to him from the right. Instinctively he knew there was someone crouching beside the door.

The warning of Hernandez flashed through his mind. Death, he was positive, lurked there in the corner of the hall— the mysterious and horrible end that had overtaken his predecessors.

He must act, that was sure. But how? To shoot through the wall would be to arouse the household— perhaps the community— and if the wall were brick-lined the bullet might be ineffective. A heavy mahogany chair standing beside the door gave him an idea. He knew that a scant two feet separated the edge of the doorway and the comer of the hall, hence he could calculate, with reasonable precision, the position of his concealed enemy.

First tucking his gun beneath his pajama belt, he quietly picked up the heavy chair by the back. Then, turning it so the front of the seat was forward, he swung it aloft and brought it down with crushing force at the point where he calculated the man’s head would be.

As the chair struck a solid object a grunt of surprize and pain came from the comer, a heavy body pitched downward across the doorway, and a large machete clattered to the tile floor.

Before Leslie could find the switch to turn on his own light another flashed on in the hallway. There followed the patter of feet and a muttered exclamation in Spanish.

“Madre de Dios! They have keel the American already!”

“You mistake, Carlos. It is only a péon.”

Leslie lowered his gun as he saw Hernandez and another Mexican, both in their sleeping-garments and carrying revolvers, rushing toward him.

“What ees happen, amigo?” the former asked him.

Leslie leaned nonchalantly on the back of the chair and mechanically reached toward his breast pocket for his makings, then remembered he was still attired in his pajamas, and grinned.

“That hombre knocked on my door and I thought it was you, so I opened it. When I found he was hiding in the comer I figured he wasn’t friendly, so I quieted him with this chair.”

“Ees plenty quiet, I tal you,” said

Hernandez, bending over the prostrate man, who was barefooted and wore the simple white cotton jacket and pantaloons of the same material common to Mexicans of the poorest class.

"I theenk maybe you ’ave keel heem. Let us see.” He turned him over on his back and a livid bruise on his forehead showed where the heavy chair had struck. Hernandez fingered this for a moment, then placed his ear to the fellow’s heart.

“Ees alive,” he announced, “an’ stunned.’’ Turning to his companion, he said in Spanish. “Bind and gag him, Carlos. Perhaps we can make him talk when he revives."

The man called Carlos threw the would-be assassin over his shoulder as if he had been a sack of grain, and carried him off down the hallway.

“May as well dress now,” said Leslie. “We can’t get much sleep before midnight.”

Hernandez shrugged.

“Joost as well,” he replied. “Meet me downstairs when you are ready.”

Some time later Leslie, wearing full cowboy attire and two businesslike forty-fives, stepped into the spacious living-room. Finding it untenanted, he sat down on a divan and rolled a cigarette. A full twenty minutes elapsed before Hernandez entered.

“Ees no use,” lie said. “That damn’ péon don’t talk.”

“Came to, did he?”

“Si, some time ago. We threaten weeth the hot iron—everytheeng. No use. Says he don’t know about these head-stealers.”

“What’s his story?”

“Says he came only to rob the rich Americano. ”

“But he carried a machete.”

“To be sure. Eef you ’ad step through that door— zeep! We find you weethout the head. Those damn’ fairy are wise already, I bat you. Per’aps you better not leave tonight, amigo.”

“Fast little workers, aren’t they? Crave action. Well, let’s give ’em some. Keep that hombre here and get him to talk if you can, but meanwhile let me take the trail. I’m not going to be scared off by a sneaking péon with a machete.”

“But, señor, it ees more dangerous than ever, now. A little later we might—”

“Nix on the mañana stuff. I’m going right now if you can get someone to guide me. Are your men afraid to go?”

Hernandez shruged.

“My men are brave,” he replied, “but it ees sometimes best to meex brains weeth bravery. Go then, eef you are determine’, but remember, amigo, I warned you.” He clapped his hands and the man Carlos appeared in the doorway. “Send Jose,” he ordered, “and saddle the horses. Jose Gonzaga,” he explained to Leslie, “weel guide you. Ees three-quarter Indian, and speaks no English, so you weel ’ave to converse in the Spanish."

A moment later a tall, swarthy fellow entered. Although he wore the dress of a Mexican vaquero, his high cheekbones, hawk nose and dark skin bespoke a predominance of Aztec blood. He was beardless, and three livid scars, two on the right cheek and one on the forehead, added to the ferocity of his countenance. For armament he carried a knife and revolver, both stuck in his sash, a carbine slung across his back, and two well-filled cartridge belts.

“Buenas noches, senores,” he greeted with a flash of dazzling white teeth.

When both had made the customary polite reply, Hernandez said:

“Señor Leslie is determined to depart tonight, despite the fact that our plans have been discovered. You will therefore start at once and I will send the men after you as agreed.” He turned to Leslie and extended his hand. “Adios, amigo. May good fortune attend you.”

Leslie shook the proffered hand.

“Gracias, señor,” he replied. “I hope to play my cards better than I did on the train. Adios.”

iv

JOSE led the way through the patio to the stables in the rear. Here Carlos held two rangy Mexican ponies, saddled and ready. To Leslie he handed a carbine like that carried by the guide, and a long sheath-knife.

Swinging the gun across his back and attaching the knife to his belt, Leslie mounted and rode forth, followed by Jose. The latter took the lead as they threaded the narrow streets, lighted only by the waning moon. Later, when they emerged into the open country, they rode side by side.

At first they crossed a waste of sand, gleaming a dull silver in the moonlight and dotted here and there with desert growths— giant cacti that reared their armlike branches heavenward as if in a constant appeal for water, scrawny twisted mesquite in scattered clumps, and the more lowly prickly pears, their barbed and segmented branches twined and interlaced like the tentacles of cuttle-fish.

Later their trail led through a group of rocky hills, and thence along the bank of a narrow, tree-bordered stream, enclosed by towering canyon walls. When they entered the canyon, Jose paused.

“It is here, señor,” he announced, “that the land of the demons begins. On this spot, just three nights ago, a headless body was found.”

“And no trace of the murderer was discovered?”

“None. A riderless horse, blood-splattered and weary, wandered into Tlaxpam the next morning, and we knew what we would find, even before I started here with two companions. There was but one fresh trail— that of the horse that had borne the victim.”

“Is the trail so little used?”

“Yes, señor, since the mysterious murders commenced. Formerly it was quite popular with those entering and leaving Tlaxpam from the north. Now it is shunned as a plague spot, although a detour of five miles is necessary to avoid this pass. Only strangers, travelers unacquainted with its bloody history, use it now. and these seldom live to boast of it. Many of these have been warned, have laughed at the warning, and have paid for their foolhardiness with their heads. A few who have escaped swear that they heard the whistling of the wings of Satan, who swooped down at them without warning, and whose frightful attack they avoided only by the utmost quickness and haste in riding away. Others claim to have heard his horrible, blood-curdling laugh, and still others to have seen him lurking in the undergrowth."

“There are many people with powerful imaginations,” replied Leslie. “How long is this pass?”

“Nearly a mile. From now on we are in grave danger. Shall we proceed at once, or wait until daylight?”

“Let us go on.”

Scarcely had these words passed the lips of the American than both men heard a noise in the pass ahead of them. Mingled with the distant clatter of horses’ hoofs they heard someone singing or yelling— perhaps both— and the sounds were punctuated with the reports of a gun.

“Some drunken fool,” said Jose. “Ah! The sounds have stopped. Perhaps the demons have killed him."

The sounds of voice and gun had died, but the patter of hoofs was still audible. There sounded, however, another voice, high-pitched, cackling, as if in demoniac laughter.

“Santo Dios! The laugh of Satanas!” cried Jose.

“Pull over to that side of the road, quick!" ordered Leslie. “I’ll wait on this side."

They had not long to wait. The hoofbeats slowed down from a gallop to a singlefoot. A horse appeared, rounding a bend in the canyon wall, but the animal was without a rider.

“Demonios! It has happened!” exclaimed Jose, crossing himself devoutly. “Maria Madre preserve us!”

Leslie caught the bridle of the riderless horse and, producing his flashlight, examined the saddle and the back of the beast. Both were spattered with blood.

“The body will be lying near the point where the singing ceased,” said Jose. “Of that I am certain.”

Again came the thunder of hoof-beats, this time from behind them.

“Our men are coming,” Jose said. “They heard the shots and think we need help.”

“Here, take the reins and bring the men forward when they arrive,” ordered Leslie. “I’m going to look for the body and the murderer.”

He spurred his pony forward. A short distance beyond the first bend he saw a ghastly thing in the moonlight— a headless body lying by the roadside. Dismounting, he brought his flashlight into play. There were no tracks of human being or animal near the body, other than those made by himself, his horse, and the horse of the victim. He walked ahead for fifty feet, then discovered a revolver in the dust of the road. Five of the six chambers had been discharged. Pocketing this, he again made his way forward. A walk of a quarter of a mile revealed no tracks other than those made by the victim’s horse, and he knew the tragedy had not occurred that far back. Puzzled, he mounted and rode back to where Jose and the twelve men sent by Hernandez waited beside the body. The guide had dismounted and was standing beside the corpse.

“You found tracks of the murderer, señor?” he asked.

“Not a track.”

“That was to be expected. I have found a paper on the body of this young fool, explaining why he rode through the pass. It seems he made a drunken wager with another young blood that he could come through unscathed. The paper is the other man’s guarantee of the payment of a hundred pesos by this fellow’s bank in case his headless body is found. What is to be done?”

“From what town did this man ride?”

“Rosario.”

“Tie the body on the horse and let two of our men take it back to his relatives. Put the paper in the pocket where you found it.”

When the two riders and the horse with its ghastly burden had been dispatched in accordance with his orders, Leslie posted his men by twos at intervals of a thousand feet along the canyon. Then, accompanied by Jose, he patrolled the road for the remainder of the night.

The first faint streaks of dawn found Leslie and his companion near the center of the danger zone. The former reined his horse to a halt as the odor of burning wood came to his nostrils.

“Someone is making camp near here,” he said. “I smell smoke.”

Jose smiled.

“It is only Tio Luis, the Anciano,” he replied, “preparing his breakfast.”

“Uncle Louis, the Old One? Who is he?”

“The Anciano is a very venerable hermit who braves the dangers of this pass to remain with the holy shrine of San Antonio, which he has attended since the death of good Father Salvador some years ago. Although he is but a lay brother, he is a most holy man, revered by all who know him, and a very good friend of Señor Hernandez. He has agreed to quarter our men if we find it necessary to remain.”

“A shrine of St. Anthony here? But why has it not been moved?”

“Because it rests on a holy spot, venerated for more than two centuries. From a crevice in the hillside, just beside the niche containing the image of the saint, there flows a spring. This spring empties into a shallow pool where the sick have come to bathe for many generations and where countless miracles of healing have occurred. Whereas pilgrims often came alone in former years and at all hours, they now come only in the middle of the day and in considerable numbers for mutual protection on acount of the murderous fiends who surround this place. Did not Señor Hernandez mention the Anciano?”

“He only said quarters had been provided for the men. How do we reach this place?”

“We have only to ride up the ravine at your left, down which this small stream trickles. It is the overflow from the sacred pool.”

v

LESLIE assembled his men and led them up the steep path in the winding ravine which had been pointed out by Jose. Presently he emerged on a small plot of more even ground and beheld the home of the Anciano. It was a small abode hut, built against the steep hillside. On the left of the hut was a niche containing a life-size image of St. Anthony, and just in front of the image was the pool described by his guide, which was fed by a spring that bubbled from the rock. From a battered and rusty stovepipe that protruded from the side of the hut, there issued the wood smoke which was being wafted down the ravine, and which had drawn Leslie’s attention to the place.

At the right of the enclosure was a long, low shed, open on one side and built from wide, rough, unpainted boards. This was evidently intended to quarter the horses of pilgrims as well as the pilgi’ims themselves, for rings were fastened at frequent intervals along the back wall.

The men tethered their horses and busied themselves with opening packs, preparing breakfast, and pitching tents, while Leslie and Jose went up to the hut of the anchorite. It was evident that he had heard their arrival, for a bent figure, attired in a ragged robe of rusty brown and leaning on a staff, emerged from the doorway and hobbled forward to meet them. As he drew near, Leslie saw a face that was seamed, wrinkled and emaciated above an unkempt gray beard.

The hermit paused before them and leaned on his staff.

"God bless you, my sons," he mumbled, with the peculiar sibilant enunciation that invariably denotes the paucity or absence of teeth. “You have come from my friend, Señor Hernandez, I presume. And you have passed the demons unscathed. Deo gracias.”

“Unscathed thus far, Tio Luis,” replied Jose. “This is Señor Leslie, the great Devil-Fighter, who has come to rid us of the demons that haunt this vicinity.”

“Bueno! We have need of him, and our prayers for his safety and success will go with him on his dangerous mission. But come within and join me at breakfast if you can do with my humble fare."

They accompanied the aged hermit to the door of the hut, where he politely stood aside and bade them enter.

“All that you see is yours, my sons,” he said as he followed them into the small front room. “Excuse me while I go into the kitchen to see about breakfast.”

He hobbled through a curtained doorway into the rear room, and Leslie heard him puttering about to the accompanying clatter of pans and crockery.

Jose unslung his carbine, stood it in a comer, and flung himself into one of the chairs beside the bare table that stood in the center of the room.

“Huy, but I am tired,” he grunted.

“It has been a strenuous night, señor.”

Leslie politely agreed with him, disposed of his own carbine, and took a chair on the other side of the table. While he waited for the puttering anchorite he glanced around the room. The furnishings were meager enough to suit the taste of the most humble of lay brothers; a low cot covered by a frowsy blanket, four crude chairs, and the table at which they sat, its bare top stained with food and beverages. Beneath the single window there stood a small, crudely constructed pulpit on which lay a book, evidently a missal. Both pulpit and book were covered with much dust, evidence that they had known little if any use since the passing of Father Salvador. The plastered walls were cracked, grimy, and festooned with cobwebs.

Presently the Anciano limped through the curtained doorway. Again apologizing for the meanness of the fare, he set before them some boiled rice, a huge chunk of honeycomb, and hot chocolate.

After consulting with Jose and the anchorite, Leslie decided to post two guards at each end of the pass for the morning, do a little exploring on his own account, and permit the other men to rest, relieving the guards at noon.

Accordingly, he set out after breakfast, resolved to make a minute examination of the scene of the tragedy enacted the night before, hoping that the morning sunlight might reveal some clue overlooked in his search by flashlight.

Arriving at the place where the foolhardy rider had been beheaded, he dismounted and scanned every foot of the ground in the vicinity. The road, at that point, was less than ten feet in width. On one side the cliff rose almost perpendicularly to a height of nearly twenty-five feet, and appeared unscalable. On the other, the stony ground sloped sharply to the water’s edge. Some thirty feet from the point where the blood spots began, a clump of stunted willows had found foothold in the rocky bank. Leslie peered into these with a view to ascertaining whether or not they had been used for purposes of ambush, then uttered a cry of surprize at sight of a bloodstained object hanging among them. He drew it forth and recognized it instantly as the outer edge of a broad-brimmed sombrero. It appeared to have been cut from the hat by a very keen instrument, not in the form of a circle or oval, but more like an irregular hexagon, no two lines being equal but all lines straight, or nearly so. He noticed, also, that it was creased at each point where two straight cuts joined. An examination of the bushes revealed the fact that they had not been used as a hiding-place by a human being.

Puzzled, Leslie hung the blood-caked relic over his saddle-horn, mounted, and rode back to camp.

His men, with the exception of one who had been left on guard by Jose, were sleeping beneath the tents, the walls of which had been raised to admit the breeze. The guard took charge of his horse and looked curiously at the bloody hat-brim which Leslie removed from the saddle-horn.

He started for the hut of the hermit, intending to show his find to that individual, then paused as the sudden clatter of hoofbeats came from behind him.

Turning, he beheld one of his men emerging from the ravine. The fellow dismounted and ran to where he was standing, fear and horror written on his bronzed features. So great was his agitation that, although his lips worked spasmodically, he was unable to speak.

“Well, what is it?” snapped Leslie. “Have you lost your voice?”

The man crossed himself and muttered beneath his breath.

“Maria Madre preserve us!” he gasped. “We are all doomed men.”

“But how? Speak to the point.”

"The demons! They kill in broad daylight now!”

“Where? Who?”

“We were standing guard at the north end of the pass, Miguel and I. They have beheaded Miguel!”

“What did they look like?”

“I did not see them, señor.”

“What? Your comrade slain before your eyes and you could not see the murderers?”

“Not before my eyes, señor. I— that is—”

“You were sleeping, I suppose, on duty."

The fellow hung his head.

“We were very tired, Miguel and I, after the night’s vigil. Things were so peaceful that we decided there could be no harm in our snatching a little sleep, one at a time. I stood guard for two hours while Miguel slept. Then he mounted guard, but it seemed I had scarcely closed my eyes before I heard him utter a choking cry. I caught up my carbine and leaped instantly to my feet. Before my eyes the headless body of my comrade slipped from his saddle, and at the same moment I heard the whir of wings above my head! Although I looked upward instantly, I saw nothing!”

“This whir of wings. Was it loud like the roar of an airplane?”

“No, señor. It had a much quieter tone, like the whistle of a large bird’s pinions.”

“What has happened, my sons?”

Wheeling, Leslie saw the Anciano, who had hobbled up unnoticed, behind him.

vi

LESLIE EXPLAINED the situation to the hermit and showed him the hat-brim he had found.

“Lend us the wisdom of your years, Tio Luis," he requested. "This is the most singular as well as the most hellish thing I have ever encountered. What do you make of it?”

The old man turned the gruesome relic in his bony hands, squinting at it with watery eyes.

“A man beheaded, the whir of wings— and this." He shook his head, handed the thing back to Leslie, and crossed himself. “I fear you are playing with fire that will destroy you, my sons. We have a saying: ‘He must have iron fingers who would flay the devil.’ ”

“We also have a saying that is apt, Tio Luis," Leslie replied. " ‘Give the devil rope enough and he’ll hang himself.’ ” He turned to the guard.

“Saddle my horse, Pedro, and arouse Jose. We’ll see if the devil has left any more souvenirs.”

Once more the anchorite shook his grizzled head.

“ ‘He was slain who had warning, not he who took it,’ ” he quoted. “You have my sympathy, my son— that and my prayers.”

“The former is premature, but for the latter I thank you,” replied Leslie. "Ready, Pedro?"

“Si, señor. Jose will be out in a moment. He is pulling on his boots."

Jose emerged from the tent as Leslie started toward the horses. Together, they mounted and rode down the ravine.

They covered the half-mile to the north end of the canyon at a brisk gallop. The body of the slain man lay sprawled in the middle of the road, and his patient horse stood near by, apparently not greatly frightened by the diabolical presence which had given Pedro so much alarm.

Dismounting, both men looked carefully for tracks of the slayer, but their search was as fruitless as before. Nor was there a cut hat-brim, such as Leslie had found on the scene of the last tragedy.

Compelled at last to give up their hopeless search, they tied the body of Miguel across his saddle and took it back to camp. Leslie directed that the corpse be rolled in an extra tent-fly and sent to Tlaxpam with one of the men. Then lie detailed two guards for the north end of the pass and two to relieve those at the south end, warning them to take heed from the death of Miguel and do no sleeping on duty. These matters attended to, he instructed the camp guard to call him before sundown, and retired to his tent for a much-needed rest.

It seemed to Leslie that he had not slept more than fifteen minutes when he was aroused by a tug at his blanket. Opening his eyes, he saw Jose standing over him.

“The sun nears the horizon, señor,” he said, "and the Anciano has bidden us to sup with him. Some pilgrims visited the shrine this afternoon and left gifts for the holy man. Among them were a pullet and a bottle of wine he desires to share with us.”

"Pilgrims? Who were they?"

“Only two péons with their wives. They came here on donkeys from a hacienda near Tlaxpam, and departed after they had bathed in the sacred pool and deposited their gifts.”

"I see. Tell the Anciano we accept with gratitude. A pullet and a bottle of wine will be preferable to tasajo and frijoles. I’ll be along in a few minutes."

Jose departed, and Leslie pulled on his boots. Then he buckled his two gun-belts about him and stepped out of the tent, intending to wash for dinner at the spring. His men were squatting or lying around their cooking-fires, preparing their evening meal.

As he rounded the last of the tents he saw a man disrobing beside the sacred pool. On closer approach he recognized Pedro.

“What’s the matter? Sick?” he inquired.

“A bath in the pool at sunset is said to cure boils," replied the Mexican, stripping off his shirt. “I have two on my back, senor.”

“At sunset? I didn’t know the time made any difference.”

“Oh, but it does, señor. The Anciano told me so himself.”

Walking past the image of St. Anthony, Leslie laved his face and hands in the bubbling spring. Then, much refreshed, he started for the hermit’s hut. The sun was sinking, and he heard the splashing of Pedro as the lad entered the pool.

Rounding the corner of the hut, Leslie came upon Jose seated on the doorstep smoking a husk cigarette. In the kitchen he heard the anchorite bustling about among his pots and pans. The table was set and graced by a wide, wicker-covered bottle with a long neck.

“How is your appetite, Jose?” he asked.

“Like that of a wolf, señor. And yours?”

“Like that of a pack of wolves. I’m accustomed to eating lunch, but I’ve been too busy today."

At the sound of their voices the hermit limped out from the kitchen.

"Come in, my sons," he said. "Be seated and sample this wine with me while the pullet reaches the right degree of tenderness.”

They obeyed his invitation with alacrity.

“This is really an imposition, Tio Luis,” said Leslie as the old man filled their glasses, “but I couldn’t resist. I promise you a dozen pullets and a dozen bottles to replace these when I get back to Tlaxpam."

“I, also,” cried Jose, eagerly reaching for his glass. “We are eternally indebted to you. I propose the health of our host, señor.”

The hermit bowed, smiled, sipped his wine, and rose. “I must look to our food,” he said.

The two men sipped their wine and discussed the events of the day. Presently Jose emptied his glass and refilled it.

Then the anchorite entered again. In one hand he bore a large pot from which savory odors exuded. In the other he carried a deep plate over which a bowl had been inverted. Placing pot and plate on the table, he lifted the bowl.

“Chicken and chile!” cried Jose. “Food for a king.”

“And tortillas!” exclaimed Leslie. “Did you bake them yourself?”

His words were followed by a shout from outside— then an excited babel of voices.

Leslie put down his glass and rushed out the door. He saw a man standing beside the sacred pool. The others, aroused from their places beside the campfires, were running toward their companion. He joined the rush to the pool and saw, in a moment, the cause of the commotion. A lialf-clothed, headless body with arms outstretched lay on the very rim of the pool.

“It is Pedro!” a man cried. "The demons have slain Pedro!”

“They will slay us all if we remain,” said another. “I’m going back to Tlaxpam.”

“And I.”

“And I.”

Jose came running.

“What has happened, señor?” he asked, his tongue a bit thickened by wine.

“We’ve lost another man." Leslie produced his flashlight and snapped it on. “See if you can quiet these sniveling cowards while I have a look ground."

vii

WHILE Jose, rendered eloquent and perhaps more fearless by the wine he had consumed, sought to quiet the fears of his comrades, Leslie made a thorough examination of the body. He judged from its position that Pedro had been seated on the rim of the pool with his back to the image, dressing, when the crime occurred. The other men, occupied with their evening meal, would not have seen the attack because of the tents intervening between the cooking-fires and the pool.

Using the jutting rocks for feet and hands, he next climbed the steep hillside at the left of the image, circled the point over the niche, and descended on the right side, searching every inch of the way with his flashlight. As there were no tracks other than those he had made himself, he concluded that the attack had not come from above. It was useless to look for tracks on the hard-packed ground around the pool, and there seemed to be no other clues.

His men, he noticed, were gathered in a small group around the loquacious Jose, and he was about to snap off his flashlight and go to the guide’s assistance when the white circle fell on something that gave him pause. It was a large drop of blood on the stone floor of the niche, and directly in front of the image. With a low cry of surprize he bent over to examine it, then leaped up and whirled about, gun in hand, at the sound of a footfall behind him. He returned the weapon to its holster with a nervous laugh as he saw the Anciano standing there, peering at him with his little watery eyes.

“Sorry, Tio Luis,” he apologized, “but you gave me a deuce of a start.”

“Do not mention it, my son,” replied the hermit. “I should have announced my coming at a time like this. So the demons have profaned the sacred pool! Now, indeed, will the wrath of God smite them. You have found a clue?”

“Only a drop of the blood on the floor of the niche. It has some significance, of course— but what? How do you suppose this blood was dropped clear over here, a full ten feet from the body? And there are no blood-spots between, other than those around the body itself.”

“It is as mysterious as all else that has happened. We have a saying: ‘The devil lurks behind the cross,’ and if this be true he would not hesitate to conceal himself in a shrine of St. Anthony.”

“That explanation may suffice for you, but it does not satisfy me,” replied Leslie. Then, noticing that some of his men were saddling their horses, he hurried to the assistance of Jose, whose alcoholic eloquence had apparently not been sufficient to deter them from their avowed purpose of returning to Tlaxpam.

“Get down, hornbre!” he roared, addressing a man who had already mounted. The fellow hesitated, then did as he was bidden. He swung on the others. “What does this mean? Are you women in the uniforms of fighters?"

“We can not fight the devil,” one man replied.

“We shall only lose our lives and accomplish nothing by remaining,” said another. "Come with us, señor.”

Leslie laughed.

“Go, then, cowards,” he retorted. “Go back to Don Arturo and tell him you are afraid— that you are too white-livered to remain and avenge the death of your comrades. I’ll stay and fight these murderers alone.”

“Not alone, señor,” said Jose. “I remain with you.” He appealed again to the men. “The great Devil-Fighter stays,” he said, “to deal death to those who have slain our comrades. Boon companions we have been for many years, we and those of us who have died for our cause. The Devil-Fighter, whom we have only known since yesterday— who has only known Pedro and Miguel a few hours remains to avenge them. Is there one among us who can do less?”

“He is right,” said the man who had just dismounted. "I remain."

“My duty is plain,” said another. “I remain also.”

“And I.”

“And I.”

“Viva Leslie! Hurrah for the great Devil-Fighter!"

Thus the mutiny was quelled and order restored.

In a trice, Jose had set them at variolas tasks, knowing full well that if their hands were occupied they would have less time for fearful speculations. The body of Pedro was wrapped and swung from the rafters of the shed. The watch-fires were replenished so that most of the camp was illuminated, and men were sent to relieve the guards at the ends of the canyon.

In order to hearten his men further, Leslie decided to ride down with the two who were to take the post nearest Tlaxpam. Nothing untoward occuring after an hour’s vigil with these two, he enjoined them to be on their guard and rode away to see how the two at the other end of the canyon were getting along.

He had passed the camp and was rounding the next curve at a slow canter, wrapped in meditation as he pondered the terrible and amazing events of the last twenty-four hours, when with startling suddenness there came a sound resembling the whistle of huge pinions, directly above his head.

There was no time to think— yet he acted, by instinct rather than by reason. With catlike quickness he hurled himself sideways and hung, Indian fashion, supported by one stirrup and the neck of the pony. Something struck heavily on the saddle and he heard a sharp metallic click. Then the frightened animal bounded forward so suddenly that he nearly lost his hold. Deft horseman that Leslie was, he managed to regain his seat before much ground had been covered, but nearly lost his balance in doing so, because when he reached for the saddle-horn he grasped only empty air.

Pulling the pony to a halt he dismounted, unslung his carbine, and waited for a new attack. Five minutes elapsed— ten— fifteen, yet he saw nothing save the rugged canyon bathed in the moonlight, and heard only the chirruping serenade of insects and the occasional call of a night bird.

Holding the carbine in his left hand, he felt the front of the saddle with his right. The horn, he discovered, had been sheared away smoothly and completely. Thus, he was certain, would his head have been sheared from his shoulders had he kept his seat a fraction of a second longer when that awful, death-dealing thing had hurtled down at him from a clear sky.

And the thing itself. What was it? Something conceived by man, he felt sure—  for Leslie was not superstitious— yet designed with such diabolical cleverness as to kill with almost superhuman accuracy and leave no clue that would hint at its nature or modus operandi.

Convinced, at length, that he could not further his cause by remaining longer, Leslie removed his broad Stetson and fastened it to the saddle-ring with the chin-strap. Then he mounted with a better view of the air above his head and rode, carbine in hand, to where the two guards were posted. Finding that they had nothing to report, he left them with a warning to maintain the utmost vigilance, and rode slowly back toward the camp. While he rode, albeit he kept a weather eye for danger, he was thinking, and to such purpose that when he reached camp a new plan had completely formed in his mind. He greeted Jose with a disconcerting smile as that Avorthy came out to meet him.

viii

“THE señor is amused?” Jose answered the smile of Leslie with a flash of his white teeth. “Perhaps he has discovered something.”

“Nothing new, Jose,” Leslie replied. “Just thought of a new scheme to work on this so-called ‘devil’. ”

“And the scheme?”

“I’ll show you in a minute. Go and ask Tio Luis if we may tear three or four boards off his horse-shed.”

“Tio Luis retired for the night shortly after you left. Should we disturb him for such a trifle?”

“No, let him sleep, but bring four boards into my tent, a riata, and a couple of good sharp machetes. Don’t make any more noise than necessary, and say nothing about this to the others."

“Si, señor.”

As soon as Jose departed to do his bidding, Leslie went behind the tents and pulled a huge armful of grass. With this he entered the rear of his own tent, deposited it on the floor, and lighted his lantern. Then he opened one of his saddle-bags and took therefrom a complete suit of cowboy attire.

Jose returned in a trice with the boards and the machetes.

“Now bring me a saddle,” Leslie ordered.

When Jose got back with the saddle he found the American industriously halving one of the broad boards with a machete. The wood was partly softened by dry rot, though firm enough not to crumble, and was consequently easily shaped Avith the keen blade.

Leslie finished this board, which was about six feet in length, and handed it to Jose.

“Cut me another the same shape,” he said.

Jose worked swiftly, but stole a curious glance at Leslie from time to time as the latter cut one of the remaining boards into four pieces, the other into two, and then proceeded to cut holes and notches in them.

The boards shaped, Leslie cut the riata, a piece at a time, and began lashing the boards together, using the notches and holes for the purpose. When Jose saw a figure resembling the frame of a scarecrow beginning to take shape he grinned broadly.

“Por Dios!” he cried. “Do you expeet to fool the devil with so simple a thing?”

“Wait until it’s finished,” Leslie answered, drawing the trousers and boots over the frame and stuffing them with grass. “Bring a horse around behind my tent while I finish this work of art.”

His own effigy completed to his satisfaction, Leslie clapped his Stetson over the head and lashed the thing to the saddle with what was left of the riata. Then he lifted the rear tent-flap and passed it through to the waiting Jose. Together they placed the dummy on the back of the surprized and annoyed pony, and stood back to view their handiwork.

“Viva!” exclaimed Jose. “Your double sits the horse, señor.”

“Now for the rest of my plan,” said Leslie. “I want you to saddle another horse and lead this one, giving it about twenty feet of rope. Ride very slowly up and down the canyon until the attack occurs. If we may judge by our previous experience it is almost sure to come. The enemy will attack the rear man for two reasons. One is that an attack on the man in front could be seen and perhaps frustrated by the man in the rear, and the other is that the thing looks like me in the moonlight nd I have reason to believe my head would be preferred as a souvenir above all others in this company.

“While you are walking your horses on the trail below I’ll follow at a distance of about a hundred yards on the cliff above. I have a pair of moccasins here that will eliminate any clatter I might make with boots and spurs, and will thus have a chance to view the attack from above while you look on from below."

“Cáspita! Now we will get this devil, for sure.”

“I hope so. Go and saddle up while I put on my moccasins. If we have any traitors in camp they will see us ride away together. If not, there will be no harm in temporarily deceiving them. I’ll throw the end of the lead rope to you from behind the tent, when you’re ready to start. Then I can hike over to the top of the cliff and wait for you.”

As Jose, some moments later, rode down the arroyo apparently followed by the American, Leslie stood and viewed his handiwork with pardonable pride for a moment, then scurried up to the top of the cliff and waited for the guide to appear below him.

It was not long before what looked for all the world like two horsemen riding in single file emerged from the arroyo and started toward Tlaxpam at a leisurely pace. Following his preconceived plan, Leslie kept about three hundred feet behind them on the cliff top, his moceasined feet making no sound, his carbine held ready for action.

A full quarter of a mile had been covered when Leslie’s quick eye caught the movement of a shadowy form near a clump, of brush at his right. It disappeared in the bushes almost instantly, and he paused, breathlessly awaiting its reappearance. The view had been so indistinct that he was not sure whether it had been a man or an animal.

After several minutes of waiting, he grew impatient and had just decided to explore the bushes where the apparition had dropped out of sight, when he saw it again, this time fully three hundred yards away and just on the brink of the cliff. It was undeniably a man, though grotesquely shaped, a man with what looked like a huge hump on his back. As he looked, he realized that the prowler was directly above the point where Jose and his own effigy would be, the guide having made considerable progress while he had been waiting for the reappearance of the figure.

Dismayed at this unforeseen circumstance that had caused him to lag so far behind the guide, Leslie rushed forward. As he did so, he was amazed to see the hump suddenly detach itself from the back of the man— no longer a hump, but something about the size of a peck measure. It was raised aloft, then hurled downward over the side of the cliff. Leslie halted and brought his carbine to his shoulder, but at this moment his quarry suddenly dropped from sight.

Cursing his own slowness, he again hurried forward, stepped into an unseen crevice, and fell sprawling, cutting his hands painfully on the sharp stones. As if in mirth at his discomfiture there came to him the raucous echoes of hideous, demoniac laughter.

He scrambled to his feet, caught a glimpse of the humpbacked figure again, and fired. Simultaneously with the crack of his rifle the figure dropped out of sight. Again he ran forward, his rifle held in readiness, straining his eyes in all directions for another sight of his quarry. He had almost eome upon the spot where he judged the marauder had stood, when he caught the movement of something in the shrubbery, this time a full hundred feet back from the cliff. Again he fired and rushed forward, convinced that his bullet had found its mark. It seemed, however, that he was doomed to disappointment, for a thorough search of the shrubbery in and around the spot revealed nothing.

Returning to the brink of the cliff he took the precaution to call out before showing himself.

“Jose.”

“Que gente?”

“I am Leslie. Do not shoot.’’

“Very well, señor.”

Looking over the cliff, Leslie saw that his effigy had been decapitated, even as he had expected. It was well, too, that he had had the forethought to call out, as Jose had dismounted and was standing behind his pony, his carbine pointing across the saddle.

“Did you see it, Jose?” he asked.

“No, señor, but I heard it. Praise God it struck as you expected.”

“So I see,” replied Leslie, regarding the headless effigy, “but unfortunately I wasn’t on the job to strike as I expected. I may as well ride back to camp now and think up a new scheme. This one won’t work again. I’ll keep to the cliff above you in ease of another attack.”

“Very well, señor.”

ix

BACK at camp, Leslie’s men greeted him with a flood of questions, for they had heard the sound of his carbine. The appearance of Jose leading the horse which bore the headless effigy increased the amazement of the Mexicans, and Leslie left the task of explaining to the guide while he sat down on his cot to smoke a cigarette and think out the situation. Hearing laughter from the men outside as Jose told of the ruse, he decided that the salutary effect on them had been worth the effort, even though he had not suceeded in his purpose.

His cigarette finished, he ground it into the dirt with his heel and paced back and forth in the tent. As he was preoccupied with his efforts to think out a new plan of campaign, it was some time before he noticed that it was growing lighter outside. He stepped out, and found that most of the men had rolled themselves in their blankets to rest after the night’s vigil. Two stood guard, however, and Jose squatted beside a smoldering fire, heating a pot of chocolate.

He was about to join the latter beside the fire when he noticed smoke issuing from the stovepipe that protruded from the side of the Anciano’s hut. Evidently the hermit was an early riser. Perhaps, thought Leslie, he could offer a suggestion for the next move in the campaign. At any rate, he should be told about the boards and the effigy.

Going to the hut, Leslie rapped smartly on the door. There was no response. He rapped again. Still no response. Puzzled, he swung it open and entered. Seeing no one, he walked into the kitchen. There was nobody in sight, and no sign of a fire in the stove. Yet he had, just a moment before, seen smoke issuing from the stovepipe.

Confronted with this paradoxical situation, he stepped forward and felt the pipe. It was quite warm— almost hot. He looked out the small window and saw that smoke was billowing from the pipe even more thickly than before. This led him to make an examination of the stove. One end, he now noticed, abutted against the adobe wall at the rear of the hut. He raised a lid, and a cloud of smoke whirled up into his face. Reaching inside the stove, he explored with his hand, and found that it was coming through a pipe which connected the end of the stove with the adobe wall.

If this told him anything, it was that someone had built a fire on the other side of the wall. But how had he got there? The hillside had been partly dug away when the hut was built. Evidently the digging had been deeper than appeared on the surface. He made a quick examination of the rear wall. All appeared to be solid adobe with the exception of a row of shelves containing canned goods, cooking-utensils, and other things, which occupied one side. These were of wood, apparently built against the adobe, yet they were his only hope. He pulled on the side nearest him, but it was apparently quite firm. Pushing brought the same result. Then he tried pulling the other side, and his heart gave a sudden jump as it gave and swung toward him. The shelving, he now saw, was nailed to a heavy oaken door with concealed hinges, the front of which was plastered with adobe.

A dark passageway yawned before him. He drew a revolver, stepped in, and pulled the door shut after him.

Pausing for a moment to accustom his eyes to the semi-darkness, he noticed that what light there was came to him from around a curve in the passageway. It was of reddish hue, and flickered weirdly in the gloom. As he advanced he noticed that the floor slanted abruptly downward.

He rounded the curve in the passageway, his moccasined feet making no sound, then came to a sudden halt; for not ten feet ahead was a sight that made his flesh creep— a grinning human skull, hovering with no apparent support, in midair. The fleshless features seemed to quiver with some ghoulish emotion, the eyeless sockets to sparkle with malignant intensity.

Conquering his repugnance, Leslie again advanced, and discovered that the skull was hung on a thin, black, hence invisible, wire just at the entrance of a square room. The apparent motion of the bony features was caused by the flickering light of a fire that crackled in a fireplace cut into one wall, and over which a huge black cauldron bubbled.

Stepping past the skull, Leslie was confronted by a charnel array that rivaled, if it did not exactly resemble, the most ghastly corners of the Catacombs. He was surrounded by skulls, some dangling from the ceiling rafters on wires of various lengths, some grinning down at him from the wall where they were arranged in divers geometric patterns, and the rest piled in a grim funebral pyramid in the center of the floor.

Feeling sure there was someone near by, Leslie looked carefully about him. There were two entrances to the chamber, the one by which he had come, and another in the opposite side of the room. After investigating the second opening, which led into a dark runway, he w r alked to the fireplace, curious to know what was being cooked in the kettle.

Peering over, he saw a seething mass of liquid with a dark spot in the center. Then the dark spot moved— it was black hair— and the ghastly dead face of Pedro, turning with the movement of the water, looked up at him. Beneath it, another head was slowly turning toward him— the head of Miguel. He drew back, sickened and horrified, then paused, listening intently. Distinctly, he heard the sound of footsteps in the passageway he had not yet explored.

With catlike quickness, he bounded noiselessly into the passageway by which he had come, and trusting to the comparative darkness for concealment he waited a few feet from the opening.

Prepared as he was for strange sights, Leslie gasped in amazement at the weird figure that entered— a tall, gaunt being, attired from head to foot in tight-fitting scarlet, and wearing a Mephistophelian hood and mask. As the man advanced to the center of the room with the springy tread of an athlete, Leslie saw that he was well muscled, and would make no mean antagonist in a rough-and-tumble fight. In his right hand he held a coiled rope, one end of which extended over his shoulder. He turned and eased a burden to the floor— a queer-looking contrivance that was fastened to the other end of the rope. It was cubical in shape, each dimension being about twelve inches, and was apparently made of steel. Projecting from the bottom on each of two opposite sides were three stout bars about four inches in length. Between each middle bar and corresponding end bar was stretched a powerful steel spring. The rope was fastened to an iron ring riveted near the bottom.

The demoniac figure knelt on the floor beside the thing and fondled it as one might a faithful dog. Then there issued from behind the hideous mask a horrid peal of laughter that caused cold chills to run up and down thespine of the American, for it was the same sound he had twice heard before, and each time after a headless victim had been found on the road.

The maniac— for such he appeared to be— continued to stroke the thing that lay on the floor before him.

“You have done well, degollador mio,” he said. “Heh, heh, heh, my little one, you have done famously. Never was there a headsman like you. I swear it. Three heads between two suns! Cáspita! If the harvest continues thus, our vow will soon be fulfilled. Had that cursed Gringo not evaded us with his clever tricks we should have had four, but never mind, my pretty. I promise that you shall taste his cursed heretic blood ere another sun has set. Heh, heh, heh! We will fool this self-styled ‘Devil-Fighter,’ my little one. We will send him to try conclusions with Satanas and his imps. But we must rest ere that is done, so now to business.”

So saying, he half raised one end of the contrivance and pressed his knee against it. Then he grasped the two middle projecting bars and pulled them toward him with some difficulty because of the resistance of the powerful springs. At the sound of a sharp click, he released his hold and the bars remained where he had left them, the springs now drawn taut the entire length of the sides. He took hold of the ring, and gave the whole thing a shake. A gory head rolled out upon the floor, and Leslie instantly recognized the face of another of his guards, probably caught napping in the early morning hours.

Seizing it by the hair, the maniac carried it to the kettle and dropped it into the boiling water. Then, drawing a heavy machete from his sash, he prodded within the kettle, apparently testing the tenderness of the others.

Leslie, feeling that the time for action was at hand, stepped softly into the room, his six-shooter ready for action. The killer stood with his back toward him, still prodding the grisly contents of the kettle, but, loathsome and deserving of death though he was, Leslie could not shoot him down in cold blood.

“Surrender or die,” he shouted.

The maniac swung around, and with the same movement, hurled the heavy machete straight for the breast of the American.

Leslie had no time to dodge the keen blade of the killer that was hurtling toward his heart. He could not possibly have moved his body fast enough. He could move his hands, however, with lightninglike rapidity, or he would never have lived to earn the title of “Two-Gun Bart.” With a movement quicker than eye could follow, he parried the blade with the barrel of his six-shooter, then covered his enemy once more as the weapon clattered to the floor.

“Your last chance, hombre,” he roared, bounding forward. “Do you surrender?”

“I yield, señor. You see I am unarmed. What would you?”

"First remove that mask, that I may see what servant of Satan hides behind his features.”

“But, señor—”

“Remove it, I say!” He jammed his gun into the midriff of the killer.

“Let me go. I will pay you well— make you rich. The government offered you twenty thousand pesos. I will double it. I will—”

“Dog!” With a sweep of his free hand Leslie tore the mask away. As he did so, a long, tangled beard tumbled down over the scarlet breast and the little watery eyes of the Anciano looked into his! Then the straight back bent, the shoulders assumed a familiar droop, and the voice became a sibilant whine.

“Mercy, good señor, en el nombre de Dios! Would you slay a helpless old man?”

“A cold-blooded murderer deserves no pity.”

“But I was justified. I swear it. Give me a chance to explain.”

“You couldn’t possibly be justified, but if you are anxious to talk I’ll listen for a little while.”

“Gracias, señor. Do you know who and what I really am?”

“I know you as Tio Luis, the Anciano, and recently, as Tio Luis, the murderer. Anything else could matter but little.”

“Of that you shall judge. My name is not Luis at all, but Tomas Perez. Neither am I of common mestizo stock, as you no doubt suppose. Through no fault of my own there flows in my veins enough Spanish blood to lighten the color of my skin and give me this beard, yet my people were Yaquis, and I am one of them, heart and soul.

“No doubt you have heard or read the sad history of my people. If you have not, then picture a tribe, a nation, peace-loving, hard-working tillers of the soil, oppressed for hundreds of years by every form of outrageous tyranny known to man, yet bearing it all with meekness, striving to overcome evil with good. Such was the nation of the Yaquis.

“Not content with squeezing the last peso from my people by unjust taxation, the government presently began the confiscation of our lands. A few of our sturdier souls rebelled and were promptly massacred. Then came the order for wholesale deportation. My thrifty father had acquired a small but fertile farm in the rich Sonora Valley. With the help of my mother, brother, sister and self, he had been able to eke out a meager existence and meet the extortionate demands of the tax collectors. One day the Bur ales came with orders for the confiscation of our farm, and our deportation. We had done nothing wrong, yet we were Yaquis. That was enough for the government.

“A dashing young lieutenant was in command. My sister was pretty, and after he had ordered his men to drive us down the road like sheep, he bade her remain. I never saw her after that. With thousands of others of our race, we were transported to Yucatan, and there sold as slaves, mostly to the owners of the sisal hemp plantations. My mother died on the way— of grief, I think. My father succumbed, soon after our arrival, to the combination of hard work, cruel treatment and little food. Having the endurance of youth, my brother and I were able to keep body and soul together, though life was a constant horror. My chief consolation was derived from the good Padre who came to visit us, and who took quite an interest in me. It was in my talks with and observance of him that I gained a knowledge of priestly ways which has stood me in good stead since that time.

“But to go on. Although I have always been unusually quick-tempered, my brother had this trait to a more marked degree than I. Many times I have seep him fly into a frenzy over a mere trifle. Small wonder then, that he should, one day, let his hatred overmaster his judgment when the overseer struck him with a whip. He seized it and lashed his tormentor across the face, but his triumph was short— his end bloody— for the overseer decapitated him with his machete.

“For me this was the last straw. My sister had undoubtedly been ravished and murdered, my mother had died of grief, my father from cruelty, and now my little brother, the only one left for me to love, had been slain. All this I charged, and still charge, to the rapacity of the Mexican government.

“I was ordered to bury the body of my brother where it lay, unshriven, and mourned only by me. Over his grave, with tears streaming down my cheeks, I took a solemn oath that if ever I should be able to escape from that place alive I would take a thousand Mexican heads to pay the debt. I bided my time, and one day my opportunity came. When I left, I took with me the head of the overseer who had slain my brother.

“My first act on the open road was to rob a traveler of his mule, his pack, and his head. The pack, I found, contained a large store of cheap but gaudy jewelry which I hawked to advantage in the villages through which I passed. Whenever I saw the chance I would take a head, remove the flesh by boiling, and store the skull in my pack.

“Within a month my jewelry had all been sold and my money was exhausted. I obtained employment in the shop of a horseshoer, and it was while there that I conceived and secretly manufactured my little degollador, as I call it. It is so designed that when it drops over a man’s head, the impact with his shoulders releases the razor-sharp blade, usually severing his head from his body. If the blade strikes a vertebra and sticks, then a sharp pull on the rope completes the job. But to go on with the story.

“I chanced to come here, and found that the place was admirably suited to my purpose. I did not live in the hut at first, but camped on the hillside not far from here. I succeeding in collecting many skulls from travelers riding beneath the cliffs, and of course I left no traces. One day while wandering on the hillside I came upon an opening that excited my curiosity. Seeing that it penetrated quite deeply I made a number of torches with dried grass and explored it. It led me to a small chamber behind the image of St. Anthony, and I found, to my amazement, that the slab which formed the rear panel of the shrine was, in reality, a door, easily opened from the inside, and swinging on brass hinges which, though corroded, were still serviceable. The drop of blood which you found at the base of the shrine bears me out in this, as I used that door when obtaining Pedro’s head while you and Jose waited at the table for your chicken and tortillas.

“Exploring further, I found this room and its connection with the rear of the hut. The two rooms and the tunnels had evidently been used at some forgotten time by the keepers of the shrine, as a place of refuge during Indian attacks.

“That evening I took the head of Father Salvador while he was exploring the hillside for herbs. The next day, when a company of pilgrims came— they had already grown fearful of the neighborhood and came in numbers— I told them I had discovered the body near my camp. They swore he had been murdered by the devil, such being the popular superstition regarding the other deaths because I never left tracks, and it was not difficult for me to persuade them and the authorities who came later that I would be a suitable guardian for the shrine.

“One day I noticed the advertisement of a costumer in a paper from Mexico City which had been wrapped around a bottle of tequila given me by a pilgrim. I took a train down there and purchased three costumes from him like the one I now wear, giving, of course, a false name and address. The costume fitted well with the popular superstition regarding the place, and I felt that it would afford me considerable protection in case I was seen. Is there anything else that puzzles you?”

Leslie considered a moment.

“Yes. There are several things. For one, how does it happen that you can throw that thing with such uncanny accuracy

“In the same way that a vaquero can throw a riata with equal accuracy. By practise. I practised for weeks before I attempted to use it at all as a substitute for the machete. You are one of the very few live targets I have ever missed.” He took a skull from the pyramid and handed it to Leslie. “Here. Roll this across the floor as swiftly as you wish, and let me show you."

Leslie waited for him to pick up the instrument of death and poise it aloft. Then he rolled the skull at the opposite wall. The Anciano hurled the thing with catlike quickness, but it fell, not over the skull, but over the head of the American. With a cackle of diabolical glee, the hermit jerked the rope taut.

Leslie had bolstered his revolver when he rolled the skull, hence both his hands were free. As the infernal machine descended over his head he instinctively put up both hands to throw it off, but this was prevented by the Anciano’s jerking the rope taut. The keen blade was beneath his chin, almost touching his throat, but the trigger bars had not yet touched his shoulders. Had they done so his death would have been instaneous. Still tugging at the rope, the hermit quickly shortened the distance between them. Then, grasping the ring with one hand, he dropped the rope and suddenly pressed down on the machine from the top with the other. The trigger bars struck Leslie’s shoulders, but quick as the hermit had been, the American was again a shade quicker. Shifting his own hold, he had grasped the two bars that moved the blade, using the pressure on the back of his neck to keep it from his throat. The springs were tremendously powerful and he had all he could do to keep the keen blade away, the Aneiano meanwhile keeping the thing pressed down on his head and jerking at the ring behind.

The struggle that ensued was the most fearful in Leslie’s experience. The Anciano, he found, was a powerful athlete, notwithstanding his previous pretended feebleness. Twice his chin was cut to the bone by the razor-edged blade as the hermit jerked him about. The thing that galled him the most was the fact that he could not fight back. Although his six-shooters were belted about him he dared not let go with either hand to reach for a gun. His sole consolation was that his enemy was in like case so far as his hands were concerned, though a long way from being in such desperate peril.

Struggling intensely, bleeding profusely from the two cuts in his chin, Leslie soon found his strength ebbing at an alarming rate. He lashed out blindly with his feet and sometimes succeeded in kicking the enemy’s shins, but the softness of the moccasins rendered this ineffective.

Knowing that the unequal struggle could not last much longer, Leslie at length resolved on a desperate plan. First relaxing, to make it appear that his strength was gone, he suddenly bent double and, at the same time, pushed upward with both hands. The hermit, taken completely by surprize, was first jerked forward, then catapulted over the head of the American. Although the movement jerked the machine from his head, Leslie received a severe cut on his forehead.

The blood trickled down in his eyes, half blinding him, so that he could but dimly see the hermit lying on his back where he had fallen. Whipping out his knife, Leslie cut a piece from the riata and pounced on his prostrate foe, who appeared partly stunned from his fall. It was but the work of a moment to turn him over and bind his hands behind him. Another piece, cut from the same riata, served to secure his feet.

“There, damn you!” he snarled, rising unsteadily and wiping the blood from his eyes. “I guess you won’t try any more tricks.”

The hermit made no answer, but there came a sound that instantly put Leslie on his guard— the clatter of boots and the jingle of spurs in the passageway through which the Anciano had come. Instantly supicious, Leslie drew both six-shooters and crouched behind the pyramid of skulls, convinced that no one but an enemy could have come from that direction. He lowered both guns with a nervous laugh a moment later, as Jose stepped through the doorway. Behind him came a dapper caballero whom Leslie instantly recognized.

"Hernandez! ” he cried in surprize. “How the devil did you get here?”

“Ees ver’ simple, amigo,” Hernandez replied, warmly shaking the proffered hand. “I get desperate an’ use the hot iron on that damn’ péon today. Then he’s talk plenty. Ees tal me Tio Luis gave heem the order to get your head, promising heem many blessing een return. He’s tal heem that he who cuts a heretic gets eight years’ absolution.

“Right away, I smell the mouse, and ride out here weeth two men. Jose, I find cooking breakfast, an’ he’s tal me you’re in the hut. I go there, but find no one, so return to Jose. He’s say maybe you ’ave gone to look for the trail where you shoot at the devil last night. We go there and find trail ourselves. It leads to a hole in the hillside an’ a passageway which we follow to this place. I see you ’ave those devil, all right, but where ees the Anciano? You must get heem also to win those twenty thousand pesos, for both are guilty.”

"Fair enough," replied Leslie. "I call you. Take a look at this man’s face.”

Hernandez bent and turned the Anciano on his back, then straightened up with a cry of amazement.

“Tio Luis! Son of wan gun! You win, amigo.”

____________________

7: An Arc of Direction

An Astrological Tale

Junius B. Smith

1883-1945

Weird Tales, June 1925

THE younger man east the stub of his cigarette from the open window and laughed. “Your theories are absurd, my dear Elton. If a man could always tell when to sow and when to reap, his fortune would be assured.”

“Exactly,” Elton agreed, fingering the pages of a book on astrology, which he evidently had been perusing when the other came in. After a moment he continued: “Naturally you don’t believe one may look into the future."

“If you want my candid opinion... I do not. I may say I will have coffee and for breakfast, but I am not certain of it... I may be dead when breakfast time comes.” He rolled another cigarette and set it alight. “I may not even finish the smoke in my mouth,” he added, as he tossed the still blazing match out of the window.

Elton viewed the act with a little frown upon his face. “I’m afraid, friend Hall, that to you fate will be fate indeed, for you act without due thinking. For instance, how do you know where that cigarette stub went, or the match that followed it? For all you know, it may have struck tinder and I may be seeking accommodations elsewhere tonight."

“Tut, tut! There’s nothing outside but some vines running up the wall, as they do over at my place, and some flowers and grass on either side the cement walk. I saw all that the last time you showed me your horticultural skill.”

“You assume there has been no change... you do not really know. And one who trusts in chance has his destiny fixed by the stars. Just when and where were you born?”

Hall took the cigarette from his lips as Elton reached for a sheet of paper on which to make the notation.

“You’re really not serious, old dear? Surely you don’t take any stock in that exploded thing! Let us talk about something worth while.”

“We are doing just that. I am curious as to the date of your demise."

Hall shrugged his shoulders. “Poppycock! If I didn’t know you as a successful business man I’d think something was wrong with your head. I don’t know but that there is anyway. A doctor once told me that everybody was crazy on at least one subject. Nobody ever told me what subject I’m bugs on and I suppose no one knows his pet failing nor believes anyone who tells him. So you think you can tell when I am going to die! That’s rich... I don’t know myself.”

“You will, if you give me the information I ask.”

“By cracky! I believe you believe you can tell. I’ll bet you a quart of pink lemonade against that one-lunged flivver of yours, that I outwear your dilapidated tires.”

“Maybe so, maybe so... I can’t tell when you are going to die if you don’t tell me where and when you were born."

In the end, Hall gave the information asked.

“And now what?” asked the younger man. “Shall I wait while you diagnose my case, or shall I return at some later date?”

“Just as you like,” Elton replied. “It involves considerable work, so perhaps you’d better call around in a week from now.”

IT WAS a month before Hall again visited his friend. When he did, it was with no intention of learning his fate as foretold by the stars, but rather upon another matter. Nor was the subject brought up by him, though what he said directly opened the question:

“I’m going to be married in September.”

Elton considered the statement for a moment but said nothing.

“Sweetest girl you ever saw,” Hall amplified.

Still no comment.

“You’re to stand up with me, if you will. It was that which brought me here today.”

“I am glad you came,” Elton at last broke his silence. “I was about to set forth and find you. Your announcement does not come as a surprize to me, for such an attachment is shown in your horoscope for this time. But” (and he weighed his words carefully) “if you really want the girl, you had better marry her... immediately. Of course, she might object to being left a widow so soon…"

“Shall I call a doctor for you, Elton? You talk as if you’re sick.”

“I’m not sick and I don’t need a doctor. But in all seriousness, friend Hall, you need a nurse or at least a bodyguard in the very near future, for according to my calculations, on the tenth of next month, unless you do something to prevent it, you will most assuredly be... hanged.”

Hall looked at Elton for a full half minute, then spoke: “You surely don’t believe that bunk! If you are joshing, I think you have gone far enough."

“I was never more serious in my life. According to my calculated arcs of direction...”

“Arcs of... what?” Hall involuntarily exclaimed.

“Arcs of direction... planetary angulations we astrologers calculate to tell when a designated result will materialize."

"Oh, I see... First you tell what is going to happen to a fellow... and then... when. So I’m going to be hanged on the tenth of next month. Quick work! I haven’t killed anybody yet... and they don’t hang them that soon, even if I should go out and kill somebody between now and then.”

“Oh, there are lots of ways you might get hanged. Some overenthusiastic citizens, for instance, might string you up to the nearest telegraph pole or convenient limb. You wouldn’t be the first man who had suffered a vicarious death.”

“Quit it, Elton... you’re making my nerves jumpy.” He moved toward the window and looked out.

“I’ll miss you greatly,” Elton replied. “Let me tell the girl all about it... maybe she’ll marry you at once to take care of you. Get a bodyguard or do something. Believe me a fool, if you like, but don’t take a chance. Fate has an unkind way of pulling mean little tricks.”

“You gloomy old cuss... you’ve scared me out of a year’s growth. You look as if you were attending my funeral already.”

THE TENTH of the following month came and Hall had taken no precautionary measures. Every time he thought of what Elton told him, he felt sorry for Elton. His mind was undoubtedly slipping— pity, too! Genius and insanity were very close together.

He lay in bed and looked up at the ceiling and pondered about what his friend had told him. This was the day he was to be hanged. He never felt any farther from death than he did that very minute. Of course, he might walk out on the street and something unforeseen befall him. All in all, perhaps it were better to remain in his home all day... in bed, even... only that seemed plumb foolish. On second thought, he would remain indoors. There was no use taking chances, as Elton had pointed out. There was nothing he had to do, so he might as well do it at home as elsewhere. Of course Elton had wanted him to provide a bodyguard... some sort of a companion, who could cut him down, perhaps... but that was beside the question. "What need did he have of a bodyguard?... the bodyguard might hang him. His mind began all sorts of queer gymnastics. He was nervous in spite of himself.

He crawled out of bed when the sun, shining through the open window, drove him to it. After a shower, he slowly dressed. Suddenly an idea hit him. “Elton’s so cocksure I’m going to die today, I believe I’ll ’phone him and tell him to come over. That’s killing two birds with one stone... He’d make an excellent bodyguard... that is, if he isn’t crazy... and we can play chess, which will while the hours away. Yep, I'll get him on the ’phone immediately.”

And he did.

“Was just coming over anyway,” Elton told him.

Hall made some toast and poached an egg. His appetite wasn’t very keen. Living alone in a two-story house and doing his own cooking, when not eating at a cafeteria, was getting monotonous, to say the least. He was glad he was to be married in September. It would be different when he had a wife to take charge of the home which had been left him by his parents.

His frugal meal finished, he ran upstairs to get his chess-board and men. The sunlight was pouring through the window in added volume. It was too beautiful a day to be cooped up. But he’d forget about all that when he and Elton got to playing chess. He decided he might as well make his bed while waiting for Elton, and busied himself in that occupation.

Then he went to the open window and looked out. Elton should be coming any minute now. Speeding autos flashed to and fro. The honk of an occasional horn sounded warning. An old horse, pulling a still older express wagon, rattled past, the driver hunched on his seat. A bicycle or two added variety, and men, women and children sauntered, hurried or ran along the walks, according to what each was intent upon doing. Hall wondered if any of those down upon whom he was looking would turn aside long enough to hang him. His face lighted with rather an amused smile. He’d have to talk to the doctor about Elton ... it wasn’t good for a man to get such crazy notions into his head.

His eyes drifted to his immediate yard. A bird cooed and scolded its fledglings in the evergreen tree not a dozen feet away. He watched it feed its young. A humming-bird whizzed past his face, its invisible wings fanning the air with great rapidity. From flower to flower it darted on the creeping vines beside the house. He watched it lazily, fascinated by its beauty, its daintiness, the music of its flight. Was it possible that he, in the midst of life, was on the threshold of death?

Into his reverie broke the hum of a motor strangely familiar to his ears. It was Elton’s car, he had no doubt. He strained his eyes to catch sight of it and confirm his guess.

Then he turned to go downstairs and let Elton in.

ON the morning of the tenth, Elton became very uneasy. He was sincere in what he had told his friend Hall. He feared, however, that Hall would disregard the warning and come to disaster. Since, in most likelihood, Hall would not provide himself with a bodyguard, why not be that bodyguard himself? So Elton reasoned. It was precisely at the time when he made up his mind to attend Hall all that day, that Hall telephoned him.

He got his car from the garage and inspected the right front tire, concerning which Hall had been kidding him on more than one occasion. It was about ready to go out, but this was no time to change it. He could do that when he got to Hall’s place, or later, or let it go until it did blow out.

He was just slowing as he drew close to Hall’s residence, to make the turn into the driveway on the north of the house, when the tire went out with a loud bang.

He turned into the driveway on the rim, stopped and quickly changed tires. He might as well get it over with before going into the house, so he could wash up when he did go in.

The tire changed, he went to the front door and pushed the bell. No answer came. He knocked long and loudly. Still no answer. Worried at the silence, he started along the cement path that led to the rear around the south side of the house and paused to stand aghast at what he saw as he turned the corner.

AS HALL turned with intention of leaving the open window to admit his friend, the latter’s tire had exploded. Hall, whose nerves were jumpy as a result of his friend’s dire foreboding, started, lost his balance and fell backward out of the window. He clutched at the vines held to the side of the wall by the metal netting, but they gave and tore away and let him continue to fall. And then one, more tenacious than the rest, held, but it wrapped its sinuous length around his neck. He fought and clutched at the wire-like fiber, but the noose slipped only tighter.

He was almost dead when Elton cut him down.

_____________________

8: The Case of Minna Lang

Charles Michael Williams

1877-1950

Munsey’s Magazine Oct 1903

Wagga Wagga Express 28 May 1904

DESPITE THE dirty, discoloured card giving notice that the bench was "For Witnesses Only," the policeman who had arrested Minna Lang allowed her to sit there because he thought she was about to faint. She covered her face with her handkerchief, leaned back against the railing, and cried silently until the linen was wet with her tears.

It was Monday morning in the Jefferson Market Police Court, and the magistrate was rapidly disposing of the usual batch of cases that follow Sunday and its liberty. The place was thronged to the door with friends of the prisoners, witnesses, speculative bondsmen, and the idle, curious spectators you always find in such scenes. Outside it was raining dully and persistently, and the grimy, dark, dismal room seemed gloomier than ever in the mean, yellow light, the foggy malodorous atmosphere. Everything suggested discomforture and bad health, physical as well as moral.

The magistrate, a stout, tired-looking man, sniffed vigorously at a bottle of smelling-salts in the intervals between signing summonses and questioning and sentencing prisoners. The long line of the latter— men and women, drunkards, thieves, street-walkers, negro "crap" players, Chinese gamblers— extended along the rail before the bench far into the corridor to the magistrate's right hand. They were hustled into place by the burly policemen who had gathered up all this debris of the city's humanity as the street-cleaners sweep its material rubbish.

One by one, sometimes by twos and threes, the prisoners passed in dolorous processional across the bridge before the magistrate, and were fined, or held for Special Sessions, or discharged; while the lawyers who had found a prisoner with enough money to engage them argued the cases, and prisoners so disposed argued their own, telling wonderful lies that were no novelties here, and policemen and witnesses gave testimony that revealed scenes of crime and shame and sorrow.

Two or three young newspaper men, who looked at once fatigued and alert, stood on the bridge waiting for a "story" to turn up. At any moment something humorous or pathetic might float to the surface of this stream of sordid incident.

Beside Minna there sat a young man, who looked curiously around, licking his lips in a nervous, cat-like fashion ; and a young woman who gazed about with indifferent, accustomed eyes. One of the reporters stepped down from the bridge, and elbowed his way through the press of court-officers, lawyers, and policemen within the rail.

With a look toward Minna's bowed figure, he said to the young woman: "A good story to-day, Miss Robley?''

The department store detective gave the reporter a brisk nod in which there was a hint of fellowship, and answered: "Why, no, I think not. She was caught stealing; that's all."

The reporter nodded, and returned to the bridge, where a longshoreman with hospital bandages on his spiky-haired head was volubly relating the story of the assault made upon him in a West-street saloon.

"An', s'elp me, judge, your honour, it was only five or six drinks I'd been after having all the night!"

Through the mist of tears that veiled Minna's eyes, and the stupefaction of shame and terror that was upon her, her surroundings were as the sights and sounds of an evil dream. Everything had happened so swiftly, bewilderingly, crushingly, that she seemed to have lived a year of pain since yesterday. She tried agonizingly to recall what had gone before her arrest, as if, were she to get in touch with her former life, she would awake from the nightmare. And every moment the policeman who had her case in hand was getting nearer and nearer to the magistrate as the line moved along.

ii

THAT MORNING Minna had walked across the Brooklyn Bridge on her way to work, slowly, because she did not like the work she was going to, and sadly, because she had not seen the Blond Stranger since Saturday. Minna had worked in stores for years, ever since her father died and she had to help her mother to care for the smaller children. She was a pretty girl, pale and slim, with much exclusion from air and sunshine, but of a robust constitution, withal bequeathed from sturdy Scandinavian ancestry. When she came home at night she cooked dinner, washed dishes, and afterward sat down with her mother to help on the sewing the widow took in.

She knew other girls, shop-mates, who were not burdened with such duties, who had more time and more inclination for amusement, and spent nearly all their salaries of six or seven dollars a week for it. She did not care to join them. Her outward life was spent in the noise and glare of a city work day, but inwardly she lived a life of subtle reserve, and knew the twilights of romance. This she owed to her novel reading. She drew her books from the public library, and they were always with her.

She read it in the car when she did not walk across the bridge; she read in her noon hour; she read in bed until her tired eyes closed, and the vague dreams her books inspired gave her escape in blessed moments from her drab, work- a-day world.

The Blond Stranger was to her like a figure stepped from the shadowy region wherein moved the characters of her favorite stories. She knew now that his name was Gene McCarthy, and that he was a sign-painter, but she preferred to think of him as the Blond Stranger.

One evening, a few months before, when she was walking homeward across the bridge in the evening, her book had slipped from under her arm. A young man close behind her picked it up and returned it, lifting his hat from a head of curly yellow hair. She thanked him, and he smiled in such pleasant good nature that they moved on together for a few steps, talking little commonplaces:

"Thank you very much!"

"Don't mention it. It's a lovely evening, ain't it ?"

"Yes, ain't it fine? Spring is here!"

Then Minna recollected propriety. She fell back with a little blush, and the young man moved regretfully on, alone.

And spring had indeed come for Minna Lang. Nearly every evening, when it was fine, after that, she met him on the bridge. When she did not, the day was spoiled for her. Once or twice she thought he was about to speak to her, and her heart would flutter; but a spirit of shy reserve would restrain her from making any sign that she would welcome an advance, and McCarthy would forge on ahead. Feeling at once satisfied and regretful, Minna would watch his slight, strong form with soft eyes.

And one memorable evening, he being bolder, or she more evidently willing, he had spoken to her and walked homeward with her, and she found out that he lived just around the corner, and that she knew his sister by sight.

That night had been only a few weeks ago, just after she lost her position and passed five heart-breaking days in looking for a new one, which finally she had secured in the kitchenware department of a store on Sixth Avenue.

iii

YOU HAVE seen caged animals in a menagerie. You have seen them there padding softly up and down, up and down, discontented, sullen, unhappy. You would have thought of them if you had seen Jackson, the floor-walker in Minna's department.

With hands clasped behind his back, with head bent over his narrow chest, with bright, sharp eyes peering as his head swung from side to side, he, too, padded softly up and down. But he, unlike the animals, was very well satisfied with himself, almost happy. He took pleasure in his work, he knew he would be rewarded. Some day he would be a superintendent or a manager.

But Minna Lang watched him with frightened, fascinated eyes, for she knew that he stalked her for his prey. There were none but girls in his department, and they told curious stories about him.

From the first day Minna was put in his charge she had interested him mightily. There were many ways in which he could be attentive; he practised them all. And he failed. Not for nothing did she remember her Blond Stranger and contrast him with this man, whose smile sickened her and whose look filled her with vague dread.

He tried bolder methods; and one day she raised her voice, rebuking his word or leer. Other girls heard and turned their heads, and the manager came into the room just about that time. He grew nervous; perhaps, he thought, his conduct had already been noticed upstairs. His fancy for the slim, strong, fair girl turned into acrid dislike that in some queer manner fanned the flame of his passion. He said to himself that she was dangerous; he would teach her a lesson. He would have her discharged in disgrace, so that it would be difficult for her to find employment again. Then he would go to her; he knew where she lived, and would keep track of her; and he would get her another place— for a price. He had influence in other stores; it would not be hard. How should he effect the discharge? The floor-walker lifted his head and smiled. He had thought of a way. It would be as easy as winking— and a good thing for him, too, just when he had been rebuked for not having found out the thief in his department! What luck— two birds with one stone !

iv

THE STORE detective touched Minna's arm, and urged her to get upon her feet and move forward to the bridge. Jackson, the floor-walker, who had been sitting by her, followed closely, his eyes shifting nervously from side to side. He inwardly cursed his employers. Why had they insisted upon this?

The magistrate read the affidavit handed him by the policeman, and said to Minna: "Well, did you take this money ?"

She lifted her wet face and sobbed: "No, no, no, no, sir!"

The magistrate turned his weary eyes to the policeman. "I was sent from the station to arrest the girl," said the policeman. "She was in the office then, in a faint. This man here is the complainant, appearing for the firm. They want her held for trial."

The magistrate nodded to Jackson to speak.

"Your honor," said the floor-walker, clearing his throat to be able to talk, "I didn't want to have the girl arrested, but the firm wished to make an example of her; there's been so much petty thieving among the hands, and—"

"Never mind all that. State your case."

"Your honor, the firm's lawyer is expected here at any moment, and I'd like to wait till he gets here."

"The case is called," said the magistrate; "you are here yourself, and if the defendant wishes to proceed I don't see why we can't go on."

Minna looked up at him. "Yes, sir, let us get it over," she said; "it's some terrible mistake, I know, and this man, sir—''

"Go on," said the magistrate to Jack son, and then, dropping his eyes to Minna : "You can say what you like afterwards."

Jackson licked his dry lips and said :

"We have known for some time, your honor, that some of the girls were cheating us. They would, we suspected, make out slips for sales in smaller amounts than they came to, hand the correct change to the customer with goods sold, and keep the difference. In our store, which is but newly opened, the girls bundle up the goods themselves, which are not checked, and when a customer leaves the store there is no way of knowing exactly what they have bought, when the salesladies are not honest . We are going to improve the system, make it more up-to-date—"

"Go on, sir," snapped the magistrate; "you are not here to advertise your store."

"Well, sir," said Jackson, "we tracked these thefts to Miss Lang's counter. I have been watching her for some time, and I became convinced that she was the thief. She has not been with us long, and I instructed Miss Robley, the detective, to go to Miss Lang's counter this morning, in the Monday bargain sale, when the crowds were thickest about the counter. I told her to buy a dollar and ten cents' worth of goods, tendering a five-dollar bill in payment. I was to go into the cashiers booth— we have an electric cash system, your honor— and handle the wires and carriers from that side of the room. It was in such a position that Miss Lang could not see me. Miss Robley made her purchase, and I opened a carrier in which there was the five-dollar bill, marked by Miss Robley as we had agreed, and a check made out in Miss Lang's handwriting, and signed with her number. It was for ten cents, not for one dollar and ten. I sent the change back, putting in a two dollar bill, a one-dollar bill, which I had marked, and one dollar and ninety cents in silver, and sent it all back to Miss Lang. I went there immediately myself. Miss Robley was there. She had bought, as I had told her, one dollar and ten cents' worth of goods, and she had received the correct change from the five-dollar bill— three dollars and ninety cents.

"I at once called Miss Lang from her counter and took her to the office, accusing her of the theft of the missing dollar. She cried, and said she hadn't taken it. But the proof was clear—"

"Will you attend to the matter in hand, sir?" said the magistrate. "It is not for you to decide upon this person's guilt."

"Well," said Jackson sullenly, "I only wanted to say that Miss Robley found the marked one-dollar bill in Miss Lang's pocket—"

"Where you put it yourself, you miserable liar!"

Jackson jumped a foot in the air, and his face turned to chalk. The magistrate lifted astonished eyes. Loud murmurs swept through the spectators in the court-room, who had been paying little attention to the proceedings. The court officers looked promptly indignant, and bawled out for silence.

Minna Lang, with a cry of joy and wonder, turned round from where, half senseless, she had been clinging to the railing of the bridge, and saw— the Blond Stranger.

Dressed in his white overalls, all stained with paint, McCarthy had pushed up the gate and was struggling in the arms of a court officer there. His eyes were furious, and he shook his free arm at the floor-walker. Policeman Sullivan, who had been watching Jackson, quietly moved his stalwart bulk between the floor-walker and the gate.

"Bring that man here!" the magistrate commanded, and McCarthy was led forward. "Sit down, sit down in your seats, everybody!" cried the court officers. "Order in the court!"

The reporters, interested at last, pushed along the bridge nearer the magistrate. Stubs of pencil and scraps of paper were produced from waist coat pockets, and one, who had neither, leaned over the bench and borrowed pen and paper from a clerk, without the asking leave.

"That man is a liar, your honor, he's a dirty, low—" McCarthy could scarcely speak in his rage and excitement . He was trembling with passion, and trying to move nearer to Jackson.

Minna watched him with all her heart and all her soul.

"Never mind about that now," said the magistrate, leaning over his desk— a circumstance of which more than one reporter made a note. "Do you know anything about this case?"

"Yes, your honour, I do." Still panting for breath, the sign painter faced the magistrate.

"What do you know?"

"I know that this man"— an accusing finger pointed— "changed the figures on the check he talks about that Minna sent up with the goods she sold; that he rubbed out the dollar, your honour, and left it ten cents. It was easy enough, for it was all in pencil—"

"Your honour," cried Jackson in a voice that shook, "your honour, it is a lie; my lawyer ought to be here soon; it's a lie—"

"That will do for now; your time will come," said the magistrate, and he turned to McCarthy. "You will please answer my questions, and say nothing else. Do you understand?"

McCarthy nodded.

"How do you know what you say is true?" the magistrate asked.

"Because I saw him change the check."

"How was that possible ?"

"I am a sign-painter, your honour, and this morning I was working on a job on the blank wall of No. 201 Sixth Avenue, in an angle of the wall right by one of the windows of the place where Minna works. I knew she worked there, and this morning I was looking in the window to see if I could see her—"

"What is your interest in this girl ?"

A dull flush came into McCarthy's face, but he stood up like a man, and answered sturdily : "We've been going together for a time, and I want to marry her, if she's willing. I guess that's all right, ain't it?"

"Yes, that is all right," said the magistrate gravely. "Go on. You looked in this window—"

"Yes, your honour, I looked in this window, and I could just see a little bit of Minna 'way down the room through the crowd; but the most of what I could see was this man here, working away in a cage with the cash that was coming into the place. I knew him, for Minna had let out something about how he'd been bothering her, and I'd got a sight of him before on purpose to— to— your honour, I said I'd smash his face for him the first chance I got. I won't lie about it. I was looking at him, and I saw him change that check, for he was as near to me as you are, your honour, and the light was good where I stood on the swinging platform outside. It had just been lowered down. I was wondering what he was up to, and said to myself that he was knocking down, grafting on his boss, and that I had him where I wanted him if ever he bothered Minna again, when he jumped up and disappeared. A moment later I saw him speaking to Minna. Minna began to cry, and the crowd got round and hid her. I wasn't into the game then, and all I could do was to wonder what the matter was. I decided to make a little trip into the store and find out; and I called out to the men on the roof to pull up the platform, which was at the second story. They didn't hear me for some time, and while I waited I saw the policeman here, and— that dog— and Minna and another woman got on board a street car down below. Then it struck me that Minna had been arrested, and was off to Jefferson Market, and I bawled out to the men on the roof again, and after a while I was hoisted up; and then, your honour, I hurried here. But it wasn't until I heard him"— again McCarthy's fist pointed to Jackson— "that I understood his dodge!"

Here, for the first time since he had entered the court-room, McCarthy met Minna's look, and the love, the joy, the utter, complete adoration that it lavished upon him made him falter. His last words were like a dry sob. "Just think of the— the dirty trick, your honour!" he said, and broke down completely. Slowly the magistrate turned to Jackson.

"Well, sir?" he asked slowly, with blazing eyes of wrath.

"If you— you would wait for the firm's lawyer, your honour—" Jackson began.

"The complaint is dismissed," said the magistrate. He turned to Minna. "Prefer your charge of conspiracy against this young man, my dear young lady— ah, yes, you must! Officer, hold him!"

The pompous court officers let themselves go, and did not check the applause that rang through that dingy room, which joy so seldom enters.

Policeman Sullivan gripped Jackson with his huge hands.

"Yes, Minna, you in must," said McCarthy, with authority. Minna humbly obeyed.

Jackson is now in Sing Sing. And only a little while ago Minna welcomed the coming of another Blond Stranger, who she declares is the very image of the first.

___________________

9: The Strange Adventure of Tommy Lawn

Albert Richard Wetjen

Adventure 15 Mar 1927

TOMMY LAWN found himself in the water, breathless, choking, floundering and wondering what it was all about and how it had happened. He had been asleep when the Bramcar struck because the mate had had the bridge and it was his watch below. First a shock had come, throwing him clear of his bunk and against the opposite bulkhead. Then the lights had snapped abruptly out, leaving him in darkness. By the time he had groped for some clothes, struggled into them and made his way on deck the Bramcar was already settling by the head.

The main deck was unutterable confusion and totally black except where a hurriedly snatched up lantern waved and danced forward. Men ran by, shouting and making for the boats. The whole bows were stove in. Eight thousand tons of ship and nearly twice that weight in cargo could expect no less to happen when hurled at ten knots against an immovable iceberg. Falls squeaked and whined. There was a rattling of oars. Luckily the sea was not rough. Boats smacked cleanly into the water and then the long, cold swells began to sweep the sinking steamer. Tommy Lawn was racing for the fiddley, rather bewildered, when his feet seemed to dissolve under him, a dark green and noisy Mother Sea put her arms about him and overside he went.

He struggled mightily to swear— which is a thing all good sailors do— but the icy shock had taken his breath and was setting his limbs on fire) until they slowly began to numb, and he found to his startled surprize that he could kick out no longer. He managed to yell then, but he was entirely alone in the dark and water slapped into his face. He thought he heard the hard, laboring sound of oars in rowlocks but he was not certain. He rose and sank mightily on a swell. Lights blurred before his eyes, revolved, growing to a red and then a purple shade, eventually all turning to black. He felt some one touch him on the shoulder—

“We didn’t expect you so soon,” said a voice, “but we’ll find room.”

Tommy Lawn looked round and saw a somewhat stout, red-faced man with white side-whiskers and kindly blue eyes. He was very much tanned and had thin gold rings in his ears. He was naked from the waist up and from the waist down he wore thick pants of a somewhat dark material, the bottoms thrust into leather sea-boots that rose half-way up his thighs. His back and chest was strangely tattooed with flying dragons, ships, women and hairy looking men. A queer Chinese sort of snake started at his wrists and wound up each arm, disappearing suddenly over the shoulder blades. His fingers were tattooed with rings and on the back of each hand was an anchor. He wore a sort of floppy sou’wester with the strings hanging loosely down, and he looked so barbarously queer that Tommy said, “I beg your pardon,” and felt quite embarrassed.

“Name an’ rank?” asked the stranger, and he spat tobacco juice at a little blue fish that came too near. “There was a mistake over your ship, I must allow. She wasn’t due t’ hit until next year— Name an ’ rank?”

“I’m Tommy Lawn, second mate of the Bramcar,” answered Tommy very bewildered.

“An officer gentleman,” the stranger nodded. “I’m Ben the Bosun. I ’as t’ meet you all an’ show you the way.”

“The way?”

“Oh, aye! I takes so many young gentlemen I forgets they’re strangers, New ’Ands. Why Fiddlers’ Green to be sure— I ’ad an old gent from a bark outa Iquique only yesterday. She ran foul of a reef off’n Diego Ramirez. ’E was most insistent that I was wrong. Didn’t want no Fiddlers’ Green. Said ’e wanted t’ see Davy Jones ’isself an’ make ’is own arrangements. I’d been telling ’im about the Green an’ ’e said ’e didn’t ’old with sich goings on. ’Course, ’e couldn’t make no change. He was eligible, an’ th’ Old Man booked him for an Albatross and the Green. But ’e was an obstinate old gent.

“We don’t get many sich down ’ere now since th’ clippers went outa fashion. Wore a white beard and one o’ them low, pointed stiff collars. When Jimmylegs showed ’im the Locker ’e wasn’t s’ set on seeing Davy Jones though.”

Ben the Bosun chuckled and spat tobacco juice again, for the little blue fish had come back.

“I’m afraid I’m rather muddled,” said Tommy Lawn, looking helplessly about and wondering where all the pale green light was coming from. Ben the Bosun had taken him by the arm and was hurrying him downward by long trailing weeds and shoals of fish that stopped and watched them with unmoving goggle eyes.

“Tchk! I was forgetting again. Well, t’ explain, it’s th’ rule that skippers wot’ve run their craft well and true and treated their men fair, goes an’ gets an Albatross. An ’all ’ands wot ’ave the same qualifications are free o’ Fiddlers’ Green. Davy Jones don’t bother with ’em.”

“Where’s the rest of my crowd?” said Tommy Lawn. He was beginning to feel rather lonely and he had an idea that Ben the Bosun wasn’t quite right in the head.

“They was all in the boats last I seen of them. ’Cepting two of the stoke’old ’ands. We don’t ’andle them though. They goes to the North Pole where there’s fires. Casey Jones looks after them. He’s Davy’s brother— We did used t’ bring ’em t’ the Green when they ’ad boats ’alf square-rigged an’ ’alf steam, but there was a mutiny after a bit because they wanted t’ run a bulk’ead down fore and aft through the Green and take the port side. So Casey fixed up a place t’ accommodate them an’ the Old Man was right pleased.’

“You mean I’m the only one lost?” asked Tommy mournfully. “That’s tough, you know. I was going to be mate next trip and get married. What’ll my girl say?”

“There’s the Daughters at the Green,” Ben the Bosun assured him. “Lots of girls. You won’t be lonesome.” He wagged his head and laughed until the thin gold earrings swung and shook. “It’s ships an’ the sea you’ll worry about. They allus do. But your Gull’ll bring you th’ news.”

“Do I have to be a Gull?” Tommy remembered that he had heard that dead sailors became sea-gulls and his heart became more mournful than ever.

“Not so to speak.” Ben the Bosun spat once again and caught the little blue fish neatly in the eye so that it went away shouting something that sounded rather obscene. “But we found that none o’ you gentlemen— an’ the focsle ’ands for that matter— could stop worrying about wot was going on aloft. Seemed like you alius wanted t’ know wot ships was sailing, an’ from where, an’ where to. Wanted t’ know in general wot was doing on salt water. There was a lot o’ breaking out at nights because o’ that an’ men and women aloft wus getting scared outa their wits, an’ Old Nick made a complaint that being scared they was actin’ too good fer ’is business. The Old Man decided then t’ arrange fer all skippers, wot was eligible, to ’ave an Albatross, and th’ rest wot’s eligible t’ ’ave a Gull. If your papers are good you’ll get a Stormy Petrel. They goes farthest and see most. If your papers ain’t so good you’ll get mebbe a Puffin or something wot don’t travel much. Some of ’em only get Penguins, an’ that’s a crooel ’ardship, I c’n tell you.”

Tommy was about to ask further questions when he found he was walking on a broad stretch of sand from which bushes of weed and tall slender green flowers grew and waved as if in some gentle breeze. There were fish too, of course, swinging around all the time and once a big fat crab waved his pincers and said hoarsely—

“Is he eligible?”

“Go away,” said Tommy’s guide, squirting tobacco juice, and the crab made rude noises with his mouth and scuttled behind a moss-covered rock.

“What does he mean?” Tommy asked plaintively. “What does he want to know?”

Ben the Bosun coughed deep in his throat and shook his head.

“Them wot’s got bad papers— too bad even for the Locker— gets shut outa th’ Green an’ all. The Locker’s where them goes wot ’as papers pretty bad. But the real bad ’uns don’t get anywhere an’ they wanders up an’ about till the crabs an’ eels get ’em. If they’re real, awful wicked Old Nick will send for ’em, but we ain’t got th’ same idees as Old Nick an’ some we turns out ’e thinks are too good fer ’im.”

“Oh, I see,” said Tommy Lawn and felt a little sick, wondering whether his papers were good enough.

“Here we are,” said Ben the Bosun at last and they stopped before a huge bulkhead that rose up in the pale greenness farther than the eye could reach. Confronting them was a door and over it a bell and at each side of the door there was a big port. Ben the Bosun reached for the long lanyard and struck the bell eight times and Tommy saw engraved on it The Noah. Ben the Bosun explained it was called that because Noah had been the first to polish it, which was a thing all New Hands had to do after being found eligible.

One of the ports opened, and a seamed, leather-colored face with a patch over one eye looked out and roared—

“What d’ye want?”

“Here’s a New Hand,” answered Ben the Bosun. “Open up an’ be right smart about it.” The other rumbled something deep in his throat and closed the port.

“He was a Pirate under Lafitte,” whispered Ben the Bosun hoarsely. “Don’t like me at all. Some o’ the Pirates we didn’t dare let in for fear they’d sack th’ place an’ run off with the Daughters. Old Nick took most of ’em. But he was better than most an’ so ’e was allowed just inside th’ door an’ given th’ berth permanent when the previous doorman ’ad resigned.”

The door opened at last and the Pirate stood with one foot on the brass storm step and stared at Tommy Lawn suspiciously. Tommy noted with a shiver that he held a great scarred cutlas in one hand and had a most bloodthirsty look in his remaining eye.

“Name and rank!” he bellowed at last.

“Tommy Lawn, second mate of the Bramcar,” Tommy managed to say. The other scowled so that Tommy added hastily, “I hadn’t time to get my uniform on.”

The Pirate jerked a strip of parchment from his belt, stared at it for a moment and then shook his head.

“You ain’t down fer today.” He looked suspicious and felt his cutlass edge with one gnarled thumb.

“A year before time,” Ben the Bosun explained, squirting tobacco juice aside. “I’ll answer for ’im. Th’ Bramcar struck afore time.”

The Pirate grunted, stared at Tommy a while longer and jerked his head and stood out of the doorway. Ben the Bosun and Tommy stepped inside. The door slammed shut.

“If it ain’t so there’ll be some as walk th’ plank,” promised the Pirate darkly as he followed the two of them down a long gangway until they came to another door with a big brass ring-handle. The Pirate stopped here, breathed forth some other blood-curdling threats and then slowly retraced his steps.

“ ’E mustn’t come any farther,” explained Ben the Bosun. “If ’e ’ad a real good look into th’ Green ’e’d like go an’ see ’is chums at Old Nick’s place and lead ’em back ’ere for th’ loot. Old Nick can ’ardly hold ’em as it is— This is the Old Man’s room.”

He knocked on the door and then quietly opened it and went in with Tommy treading apprehensively at his heels. They were in a wide, low room with beams, like the timbers of an ancient ship, running over bulkheads and deckhead. There was a great table piled high with charts. There was another great table piled high with books. And there was a smaller table behind which sat in a great chair an old, old man. Tommy did not remember having ever seen such an old looking man before. His snowy beard reached to his waist, his hair far down over his shoulders. But his eyes were so blue and young that Tommy took heart and did not feel very much afraid.

On the table near the old man’s right hand there sat a small whale which the old man was feeding from a bag he had hidden in a drawer. He looked up when Ben the Bosun stepped forward, with Tommy at his side, and the whale shuffled off the table and went and hid in a corner.

“That’s th’ Green’s pet,” whispered Ben the Bosun aside. “And this ’s the Old Man of the Sea. ’E ’olds an’ extra-extra-master’s ticket, the only one there is an’ ’e’s very proud. Call ’im sir an’ don’t argue. ’E’s awful touchy about ’is navigation.”

“Name and rank!” roared the Old Man of the Sea and Tommy squeaked the necessary reply.

“Where’s the log?” roared the Old Man of the Sea, and a quick, handsome youth with a pigtail and dressed in a midshipman’s uniform darted from behind the table where the charts lay, picked pp one, ran to the table of books, picked up one of these also and brought the both to the Old Man of the Sea.

He spread the chart out before him and turned the pages of the log.

“Humph!” growled the Old Man at last and glared at Tommy Lawn. Then he moved his forefinger over the chart, glared again and turned to Ben the Bosun.

“He’s ahead of time,” he said very sternly. “Bad discipline somewhere. The Bramcar wasn’t to hit until next year.”

“That’s wot I said, sir,” answered Ben the Bosun respectfully. “Soon as I ’eard I made a complaint but it weren’t no good. Since the Primus an’ the Hungarian went down Casey Jones said ’e ’ad too many firemen come in afore ’e ’ad time t’ make room, an’ the fires got too ’ot, so ’is engineer gentlemen couldn’t ’old the ice, they being short-’anded an’ not ’aving any new men in for some time.”

“Arrange for that at once,” snapped the Old Man of the Sea, turning to the little midshipman. “A couple of engine-room staffs will do. We can’t have that ice coming down before time. The Kronstadt and the Ariel are due to strike t’morrow. See the firemen get away but don’t lose the engineers— Have the storekeeper send four teams of whales up north ready for the new men to start work with.”

“Yes, sir,” piped the midshipman. “But the Ariel's a brig and carries no engine-room staff.”

“—— my eyes!” roared the Old Man of the Sea. “—— my eyes! Cross her off then. We’re over-manned now and a rest’ll do her good. Give her another year— Humph! There’s the Prince Rupert due to founder next week. She’ll do.”

“Yes, sir,” piped the midshipman again and he made a note in a little book he drew from his pocket. The Old Man of the Sea bent over the chart.

“Humph! I don’t know as we can accommodate you, you being a year ahead. Your papers seem to be in order. There’s a question mark here opposite the wreck of the Grosvenor. It was a foggy night and dark and the recorder couldn’t see very well. You were on the bridge.  What happened?”

“A ship named the Constantine Pearl rammed us, sir,” answered Tommy. “I saw her in time and put my helm hard a-starboard. But her officer made a mistake. His name was Lansing and they suspended his ticket for being drunk.”

“Lansing? Lansing?” The Old Man frowned. He turned to Ben the Bosun and said, “Has he been here?”

“Drowned off Bermuda, sir. Drunk an’ washed overboard. Special job undertook by the Great West Drift because o’ complaints to th’ Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide that ’e’d killed two seamen without cause an’ constant imperilled ’is ship.”

“Ah, I remember,” said the Old Man, nodding so that his white hair shook. “We turned him out.”

“The crabs complained he was terrible sour, sir,” Ben the Bosun added. “Sort of alcoholically pickled, as I might say. There was a school of ’em drunk an’ singing outside the door all that night.”

“Humph!” said the Old Man of the Sea. He shut the log book with a snap. “Nothing to talk about in your career, young man. No sign of a desperate adventure or a great piece of navigation. Humph! Now pay attention!”

He poked a large and bony forefinger in the direction of Tommy’s chest and barked, in exactly the manner of a dyspeptic marine examiner:

“Your ship is in the right hand semi-circle of a Southern Hemisphere cyclone—” he paused for breath—“running with the wind aft what change would you expect in the wind and weather?” He finished with a roar, "And state the reason!"

“I don’t know,” stammered the confused Tommy, trying vainly to dissect the question and remember the rules of cyclonic storms.

The Old Man lifted his eyebrows in vast contempt, exactly like a marine examiner.

“No— you— don’t know,” he said. His finger shot out again. “I’d like to know what the sea’s coming to— Take him away!” Ben the Bosun caught Tommy’s arm. “Passed. Eligible. Have him marked down for Stormy Petrel. Fiddlers’ Green.”

“Come on,” whispered Ben the Bosun. “You’re through. I’ve got to be off an’ pick up a skipper and mate near Lowestoft. My watch mate ’andles th’ focsle ’ands. Cheerio.”

He drew Tommy away from before the table, left him standing by the bulkhead and then went off, rolling toward the door through which they had come. Tommy could hear him arguing with the Pirate outside before the door shut and some one touched his arm. He turned to find the midshipman beside him and the youngster piped—

“This way, sir.”

They went out through another door, after Tommy had bowed to the Old Man of the Sea, who was laughing and rubbing his hands and only said, “Humph!” and Tommy found himself in another gangway that ended in a small square room where the bulkheads were crowded with brooms, holystones, buckets, mops, ropes, odd pieces of canvas, blocks, hooks, tackles, spare spars, oars, cutlases, axes, sea-boots, oilskins and a hundred other articles belonging to ships.

“Don’t worry over the Old Man’s ways,” whispered the midshipman. “He always remembers how he was examined before he had his first ship—and that was longer ago than I’ve heard of. He makes up questions now and fires them off so that he can see what he must have looked like when he was being asked himself.”

Tommy nodded, understanding, and then found himself facing a tall, gaunt individual who sat on a three-legged stool smoking a short thick pipe and was dressed in a dark uniform that was much too big for him. He had a large Adam’s apple and his face was very sour looking.

“Second mate. Eligible,” piped the midshipman. “Marked for a Stormy Petrel and Fiddlers’ Green. Usual articles.” Then in Tommy’s ear again, “This’s Jimmylegs the first mate. He was at Salamis with Themistocles and is a hard case. He can send you to the Locker for a spell if you don’t behave.”

“Come here,” rumbled the first mate, and Tommy stepped obediently forward while the little midshipman scuttled away. “We bred ’em tougher in my day, but times have changed. You can do the brasswork afterward. I’ll show you ’round first.”

He rose to his gaunt, astonishing height, with all his bones snapping and cracking. He put his pipe away. He stared at Tommy, frowning darkly for a moment, and then with a grunt stalked off. Tommy followed him, half-running, taking two steps to the lank man’s one.

They went along another dimly lighted gangway with a few hurricane lanterns swinging from the deckhead and at last stopped before a long opening in the bulkhead closed with a grill. Tommy peered  within, and there was such a noise, such a shuffling, rustling, squawking, crying, screaming, grating pandemonium that he thought he had come to the Bottom of the World where all the Utterly Lost Souls are. But when he looked a bit more closely he saw it was only birds making all that noise, millions of birds hopping and flying and quarreling, walking over weedy rocks and scratching on the sand floor of a vast cavern. And coming toward Jimmy legs and Tommy through the feathery, noisy clouds was an old, old woman with long straggly hair. Tommy regarded her with some awe as she neared the grating.

Her nose and chin almost met, and for a staff she carried a creamy, long, wavy narwhal tusk. Her clothes were in rags and she hobbled almost as if crippled, but her dark eyes were the wisest Tommy had ever seen and there was a sweet set to her lips that reminded him of his mother. He heard Jimmylegs say—

“She was here before the Old Man of the Sea. She can go anywhere and has right of wind, wave and tide. She is a Great Legend and that’s as high as any one can go.”

“What’s her name?” whispered Tommy, very awed, and fiddling with his cap which he carried in his hands.

“Mother Carey,” said Jimmylegs. And then loudly, “Ah, how are you. Mother? This one’s marked for a Stormy Petrel. Eligible. Fiddlers’ Green. Usual articles.”

“What does usual articles mean?” Tommy inquired while Mother Carey was looking him over.

“Means you’re signed on as an ordinary guest. You’ve done nothing special. No favors to be granted.”

“Oh,” said Tommy and felt quite ashamed because he had never done a thing in his sea life to entitle him to special articles.

“A handsome young man,” said Mother Carey at last in a high-pitched sweet voice, almost like a bird’s in fact. “A most handsome man. He is like that young Spanish captain who was brought from Cadiz— before the Armada wasn’t it— Coaxed and wheedled and persuaded me to let him in, and he had an Albatross, two Puffins and at least a dozen Stormy Petrels marked and set free before I could stop him. A great rascal. It took my good Sea Eagles weeks before we had him cut to his regular one Albatross— No, young man,” as Tommy began to smile, “I’m not to be coaxed again. But since you are young and handsome and I am a woman— very old though— you shall have a strong little bird, one of the best.”

She clucked quickly with a peculiar note, and out of the squalling pandemonium behind her there came, true as an arrow to her shoulder, a little Stormy Petrel, bright-eyed, sooty-black all over. Mother Carey fumbled in the folds of her dress and brought forth two little pieces of white cardboard and handed them through the grating.

“Write down your name,” said Jimmylegs, in a little more friendly tone, “and any special place you’d like to get news from.”

He handed Tommy a pencil then and Tommy thought hard. He put down his name and started to write Mile End Road, London, which was where his girl lived. But because he was a sailor, and girls died sooner or later, he wrote instead in big printed capitals, “The English Channel,” and handed the little white cards back. Mother Carey carefully fastened one each side of the Stormy Petrel’s body, near his tail, and then clucked again and the bird went flying from her. It soared up and up, circling to the room of the cavern and then went right out of sight.

“There,” said Mother Carey, laughing, “it’s gone to be born. And when it’s a full-grown Stormy Petrel it’ll have a white patch of feathers just in those places where I put your cards.” She thumped the sand once or twice with her narwhal tusk staff. “Heigho! All you young gentlemen start to put down the place where some woman lives but you always end by writing of some part of the sea. And now, young man, when you are enjoying yourself at the Green and something starts aching inside you and you want to know what ships are coming and going and what the weather is doing on salt water, you just send one of the Passengers to Cape Horn and he’ll bring you back all the news your bird has.”

“I’m much obliged, ma’am,” said the grateful Tommy politely and backed away with Jimmylegs beside him. Mother Carey clucked then, and all her birds came round her in a great cloud, silent as ghosts, and Tommy saw her no more.

JIMMYLEGS took him back down the gangway then, and they turned aside into a gloomy place that looked like a ship’s main hold, a great stuffy hold with the hatches battened down above. There were only a few hurricane lanterns burning, lashed against the stanchions and casting shadows everywhere. From all around there was a confusion of noises, clink of metal on metal, rubbing sounds, scrapings, groans, cries, a few oaths, a lot of grumbling, the dull swish of sand on wood. Tommy looked up and saw that exactly as over a great ship’s hold there were two decks above him. Jimmylegs stalked into the shadows under the deck immediately overhead and pointed at a long row of men, who were half buried in wide manholes. These men were on their knees scooping something up with their bare hands and putting it in buckets.

“These are the men who deserted their ships, masters and A. B.’s together. They’re cleaning water tanks and bilges, and their buckets have no bottoms. They work watch and watch and sleep in a focsle where the sea washes about all the time keeping their bunks wet and a man stands inside the doorway shouting out ‘All hands on deck!’ so they can not sleep. Once a week they get a day off to do their washing. They used to be allowed to visit the Green once a year but that caused trouble there because they were always trying to get every one to desert. The Old Man complained to Davy Jones about it so now they don’t get their day.”

“What place is this then?” asked the interested Tommy, very glad that he had never deserted his ship.

“This is the Locker, Davy Jones’ Locker,” replied Jimmylegs, “In the ’tween decks are the mutineers chipping rust with hammers of rubber. They still get their day at the Green every year. And up in the shelter deck are men who disobeyed orders constantly, were careless with their work and committed other small crimes. They holystone all the week except Saturdays and Sundays when they go out and get some more sand. Come on up and we’ll see Davy Jones.”

They climbed up three heights of iron ladder, past the decks where the mutineers were chipping rust with rubber hammers and the men of smaller crimes were eternally holystoning, and so up to the main deck above which was reached through a small scuttle.

“There was a lot of trouble when the Old Locker was torn down,” commented Jimmylegs as they scrambled on to the widest hatch Tommy had ever seen. “The Old Locker was taken from an Alexandrian slave galley and wasn’t a hold at all. It served for a time, but as our workers piled up it got too small and the Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide declared it unsanitary. It did smell a bit. After some consultation this new place was decided on. The workers who’d been sailing-ship men got quite excited and claimed they’d been insulted. Said their privileges were being taken away. It caused quite a fuss at the time and there was some grounds for it because no one likes to be changed from a wooden hull to an iron one. I know, being a wooden-hulled man m’self. Even the Green was disturbed about it.”

“How was it settled?” Tommy asked as they straightened up and looked around.

“The Old Man ruled that rust was rust and bilge, bilge and holystone, holystone whether it was found in a windjammer or a steam packet’s hold. And the only real change caused was that the mutineers used to chip chains in the old days and were now transferred to the inner skin. The Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide upheld the Old Man but gave all Davy Jones’ workers a day at the Green to make it up. A lot went on complaining though, so Davy stopped the swearing.”

“Stopped the swearing?”

“Oh, yes. That was the biggest punishment of all. The workers didn’t mind so much so long as they could grumble and swear, and once they were stopped doing that about the New Locker the complaining just naturally died away. There’s no more talk of it now, but Davy still stops a man swearing when he doesn’t behave. We used to send all constant offenders to tar the Equator Line, but the new way’s much more effective and we like to keep up with modem progress.”

“I suppose the Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide have a lot of power down here?” Tommy observed. Jimmylegs nodded seriously.

“It’s made up of Old Shellbacks and Sea Lawyers, and they know all the Ancient Customs and all the Privileges of Long Standing. Theoretically the Old Man has the veto power but actually he abides by the Board’s decisions.”

Tommy laughed.

“Why, that’s just like it was when I was a kid on the bark Lucien Arnold. The skipper didn’t like to go against the sea lawyers and the very old seamen we carried.”

“Well,” said Jimmylegs, “it was the same in my day. Here’s Davy Jones.”

Tommy looked up and saw an immensely fat man who looked just like a saloon keeper he had once known. The fat man was bearing down on them, his face wreathed in smiles and his eyes twinkling merrily.

“New Hand?” wheezed Davy Jones, looking sidewise at Jimmylegs. “For me? Mutiny, desertion or careless work?”

“Legible and passed,” answered Jimmylegs. “I’m just showing him around.”

“He’d make a good chipper,” sighed Davy Jones, eying Tommy’s strong arms and wide shoulders. “I’ve got a particular obstinate beam I could use him on.” There was such covetousness in his eyes now that Tommy had to swallow hard to maintain his nerve.

“I’ve heard quite a lot of you,” he managed to gasp. “I was surprized to learn you had a brother though.”

Davy Jones frowned and looked suspicious.

“Have you been poking around the North Pole then?”

“There’s a deadly feud on between them,” whispered Jimmylegs kicking Tommy on the shin. “In my day it was the men-at-arms and the seamen. Now it’s the seaman and marines or the focsle and stokehold. Davy claims his younger brother’s just an upstart to open an establishment at the North Pole. Davy’s got a lot of sympathy because he’s been here since Noah. Casey wasn’t born until a man named Fulton fiddled around with steam.”

“I see,” Tommy whispered back. Then to Davy Jones, shaking hands, “No, I’ve never seen your brother. Merely heard of him. I don’t think I’d care to mix with the black gang anyway, being raised on deck.”

“A man after my own heart,” wheezed Davy Jones shaking hands furiously and his suspicions vanishing. He leaned forward and whispered hoarsely, “I didn’t approve when they made Casey a Great Legend. But what can one do? The Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide used to be conservative enough and I had a majority there. But since these new-fangled ships came about there’s been a lot given seats on the Board with radical ideas. Yes, they actually approved of Casey. But I was a Great Legend before he was born. Never forget that, young man, never forget that. I can remember the time when they dropped a live horse overside as a little gift for me. No more though, no more.” He shook his head mournfully and wiped away two big tears.

“We’ll take a short cut,” said Jimmylegs hurriedly. “If he starts crying he’ll set up a tidal wave and that always upsets our schedules. He’s that sentimental you wouldn’t believe it.”

Grasping Tommy’s arm, Jimmylegs hurried him down a long wooden-stepped companion to a well lighted gangway and then, sliding back a big scuttle, pushed him through the opening and stepped after him. Tommy stood and gaped.

He was in a place so immense he could not see the exact limits of it. All along the bulkhead to his right as far as his eye could reach, there were bunks, each with a little curtain running along wire, each with a little shelf above for odds and ends, each with a fancy-worked canvas hold-all nailed next to the shelf. Below each bunk— they were all lower ones— there stood a long black sea-chest with handles of round sennit studded with freakish knots. In some of the bunks men lay in luxurious idleness, smoking or just gazing upward into what was apparently sheer space. Some men were on their knees before their open sea-chests, decorating the inside, painting a full-rigged ship on the lid, fitting little inside lockers to hold treasures. Other men sat on the chests and ran straight seams in new soft canvas, plying palm and needle with care and evident pleasure. One old salt near where Tommy stood was putting a difficult rose knot in the end of a four-stranded rope and another was busily making a mat of rope-ends and still another weaving triangular sennit.

“No one works except for pleasure,” Jimmylegs was saying. Tommy nodded. He could understand that sailormen must do work of some sort.

Along the opposite bulkhead, to his left, there was a certain difference. Here and there white or brown canvas hammocks were slung. Here and there were bunks broader and deeper than the others. Here and there even were great wooden bedsteads with elaborately carved posts and legs and canopies above.

“We keep the seamen to starboard and the officers to port,” explained Jimmylegs. “We had a job making them settle down like that. The men complained because some of them wanted hammocks, but that was too unsettling, though they did use to let them sling what they liked in the early days. The fact is we’re getting crowded and some sort of system had to be installed. So we ran up that row of standard bunks. The officers of course have whatever they wish. The Old Green didn’t allow for bunks or hammocks either, but a lot of the guests complained that they’d stood watch and watch for thirty years or more and they wanted to make it up.”

“I see,” gasped Tommy and stared at the huge building in the center of the deck, for deck it was below him, with seams, ring-bolts, deadeyes and bitts scattered all about, and each wonderfully decorated with Spanish half-hitching, basket knots, turksheads and flat sennit. Jimmylegs observed that it was impossible to keep some of the older men from doing this. They simply wallowed in an orgy of fancy-work.

But it was the great house that took Tommy’s fancy. It was after the fashion of an old inn, a peaceful looking place with bay windows with leaded panes, with casks outside cut into chairs, with benches and tables— long tables, round tables, big tables and little tables. Tommy caught a glimpse of men inside, laughing, playing fiddles, pipes, many queer instruments he did not remember having ever seen before. Men sat around talking and drinking from thick earthenware mugs. There were flowers everywhere, real land flowers blooming and growing, with birds flying through them. There were parrots and monkeys climbing over the house roof, and dogs and cats ran about.

“We had to let them bring their pets, and they moped around for flowers,” said Jimmylegs. “The Green’s had a lot of trouble. There’s a big lawn over behind the house where they go and dance hornpipes and such when they get the mood. The Old Man’s Daughters come out now and then and dance too and amuse the men. The Daughters hide behind the breakers and sing the ‘Song of the Surf’ so the swells don’t get out of step, but every moment they get they come here. One of the Daughters’ll get attached to you and keep you amused. It gives the men something to sing about and make fancy mats and knots for. The officers mostly write verses to them and drink their health and think up pretty things to say. The trouble we’ve always had is that our guests want all sorts of land things, but they can only think of them in a shipboard setting— Come over to the officer’s side and I’ll point out some of our chief guests.”

They walked slowly along down the great deck, teeming with life, with laughter, with deep tarry jests, with music. Every one was doing just exactly as he pleased, all those things he’d always wanted to do on shipboard and never could. Here and there bulkheads had been raised or canvas screens rigged to form separate little cabins or alcoves, and sometimes nooks were created by flowers and vines. The vines and the stems of the flowers were all carefully arrayed with fancy-work, and some of the flowers themselves grew through skilfully woven baskets of boat lacing.

“Yes,” said Jimmylegs, shaking his head sadly. “The Green used to be rigged out only like a ship. There were even masts and sails for the men to amuse themselves. But the moderns, starting from King Alfred’s time, brought in a lot of queer ideas and now we have flowers and such. The Old Man raised a fuss at first, but the Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide ruled that guests of the Green were not on regular articles, their voyage being over, and could please themselves.

“Who’s that over there?” Tommy asked, nodding toward a pale-faced, rather thoughtful man in doublet and hose, with a silk shirt open at the throat and wearing a clipped beard. He was playing some sort of game with a shorter, squatter man boasting fierce mustaches.

Jimmylegs chuckled.

“That’s Sir Francis Drake and Don Sebastian. I remember when Sir Francis first came the Spaniards here were all afraid of him. They put up barricades in one comer and wouldn’t come out for a long time. They sent a complaint to the

Old Man that he’d sacked ’em in New Spain, harried ’em over their own seas, chased their Armada many weary leagues and was now come to be their torment and their shame. I never saw men so worried— There was such a noise, every one taking sides, that the Old Man came in person to see what was the matter and, Sir Francis being a special fancy of his, he was very angry. He got them all quieted down at last, while Sir Francis just stood right where you stand now and laughed and laughed until I thought his sides would crack. It was a long time before a Spaniard would pass him without a drawn sword. But that’s over with. There’s Don Sebastian playing with him as friendly as you please.”

“Do you have many quarrels here?” Tommy wanted to know, and Jimmylegs snorted.

“Once every century or so. The last trouble we had was between the navy men and the merchant seamen. That feud seems to be almost as bad as the Great Feud between Davy Jones and Casey. Times must have changed, for in my day navy men were merchant adventurers too—

“But there’s always trouble for that matter. Some of the early Britons used to run like hares whenever a Roman or a new Northman came in. For that matter I’ve seen the whole Green look scared when a Northman was expected. See those two over there, to starboard a bit, in the queer looking clouts? That’s Thorfin Karlsefne and Leif Ericson. They’re probably arguing about Vinland as usual. Leif's father’s the biggest drinker we’ve got here, but he only takes ale. When he first arrived he organized drinking bouts, and the Green was in an uproar until the Old Man brought Davy Jones to drink him under the table. He’s never been quite the same man since— I mean Eric.”

Jimmylegs pulled out his thick, short pipe and lighted it with care.

“Nelson and Da Gama and Paul Jones, the American, are almost inseparable. There they are, behind Sir Francis, d’ye see? They play cards and gamble and quarrel about naval tactics. La Perouse joins them often. They’ll all argue about long distance cannonading and boarding with pikes and cutlas until they start hammering on the table and La Perouse will get quite nervous. Then Sir Francis will get up and roar, ‘Ram ’em an’ board ’em, sirs! Ram ’em an’ board ’em!’ and laugh his great laugh and they’ll all turn and argue with him. But we did that in my day too.”

They went into the big house at last and sat down at a small table. They had not been there fifteen seconds when Jimmylegs pounded heavily on the scrubbed wooden top and roared for some one to wait on him. There came running almost immediately a bald-headed fat little man with double chins, a pendulous lip and a white apron about his middle.

“Rum!” bellowed Jimmylegs, scowling. Tommy said, “A beer, please,” and felt quite sorry for the fat little man who was all out of breath. He panted, “Yes, sirs, yes, sirs,” and hurried away.

“That was the only thing every one ever agreed on here in the Green,” Jimmylegs commented, spitting into a box filled with sawdust that served as a spittoon. “All hands demanded for their comfort that the Owners should be waiters, and waiters they are. Some of them you see serving common able seamen once used to own lines. Those who sent ships to sea ill-found clean out the spittoons and wash the mugs. The others jest fetch and carry.”

“What about the good Owners— I mean those who treated their ships and men well?” asked Tommy.

Jimmylegs scowled again.

“There ain’t any,” he snapped. “Leastways we’ve never come across ’em. In my day it was the Syrians an’ Jews an’ Genoese. Now it’s most any bilge. We had a hard job to get ’em down here though. Y’see they belonged to Old Nick and we has to send down to the Bottom of the World where all the Utterly Lost Souls are. Old Nick’s hard t’ drive a bargain with but we exchanges ten for one because He claims that Owners is especial wicked and he hates to lose such promising gentlemen. We used t’ give him men-at-arms, those that were put aboard our craft to man th’ sterncastles and forecastles, but now we gives him marines.”

The Owner hurried up with their drinks and Tommy was groping around for a coin to tip him with when Jimmylegs laid a round gold piece on the table and the Owner smiled, bobbed his thanks and gratefully hurried away.

“We always gives ’em a bad gold piece,” explained Jimmylegs, burying his face in his mug. “They think it’s real until they try it out, just like poor sailors thought their ship was sound when she wasn’t and the grub good when it was ’ogsheaded poison. The guests get a great deal of fun out of it. It was suggested at first that all Owners be fed bad salt pork and weevily biscuit but the Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide ruled that they liked gold most of all and to be always finding it was bad would be a juster punishment.”

“This is good beer,” said Tommy, thinking that Fiddlers’ Green wasn’t so bad after all if every one got his just deserts as it seemed he did. Jimmylegs blew rum drops from his lips, smiled contentedly and went on.

“We get it from sunk ships an’ won’t touch it unless it’s years old. This rum now was casked two hundred years back and it’s as sweet as cream. Nothing but the best you’ll find here. Which reminds me there was some trouble at first about who should whack out the liquor. They wanted to give Noah the job but he wouldn’t take it on account of his not being a drinking man and disapproving of it altogether. Several have had the job on and off. You can always quit here, y’know, and the Old Man will appoint some one else.”

“Is that Noah?” asked Tommy in a whisper, pointing to the next table. An ancient looking individual in a long brown cloak with a flowing white beard and a bald head was sitting there sipping a mug of water.

Jimmylegs nodded.

“He’s the only teetotaler in the Green. He tries to start a reform movement every so often and he gets most of the New ’Ands for a while, those what have died of thirst. But they always slip away. There’s some talk of expelling him, as the seamen claim it grieves ’em to watch him sipping his water. He wouldn’t take his girl neither, one of the Old Man’s Daughters. Was terrible shocked. Said he had about ten wives and didn’t approve of concubines. Yes, just like that. The Old Man took it almost as a personal insult but he couldn’t do much without a vote and Noah was the first here so we hate to send him down to Old Nick. Still, some claims he weren’t no sailor at all, sending out birds to do his navigation for him. The Old Man and he has some hot arguments on that point.”

“I should think he’d be on the Deep Sea Board of Wind, Wave and Tide,” Tommy observed, finishing his beer.

“That was tried,” explained Jimmylegs, ramming down the tobacco in his pipe with a horny thumb, “but his ideas was all wrong. The Board’s sympathetic with most sorts of ships and men, but what could they do with a seaman that builds his ship like a house perched on a raft and don’t allow for no sails nor masts nor pumps nor hatches? Besides, he only made one voyage and was wrecked at that. And the Board claimed his only cargo was animals and he’d never commanded a crew and his view on all points was entirely different from anything else any one had ever heard of. The Board was squabbling all the time when he sat with it, and in the end the Old Man put his foot down and retired him. He’s the only retired member of the Board. A great nuisance too. Says there was only fresh water in all the oceans when he was sailing, and makes other radical statements near as bad— But whist! See who’s coming?”

Tommy looked round and saw a tall, somber-faced man in flowing garments. wearing a look of unutterable weariness. He walked right by Jimmylegs without recognition and, seating himself at a nearby table, called for some schnapps.

“That’s Captain Bernard Fokke,” whispered Jimmylegs, the first uneasiness apparent about him that Tommy had noticed. “He commands the Flying Dutchman.”

“You don’t say!” whispered Tommy back, very awed, and he half turned in his seat to get another look at the famous man.

“He’s doomed to sail forever,” Jimmylegs went on in a low voice. “Old Nick wouldn’t have him because he hadn’t committed sins enough, but while he lived he made jest of Wind, Wave and Tide and the Board got angry. He used to sheath his masts in iron so he could carry sail when other ships were shortened down out of respect for the Board’s power. The Board condemned him to sail up and down the world as a warning to mariners not to make a jest of the sea. He was a great captain once though. He went from Rotterdam to the East Indies once in ninety days— and that was long before the clippers.”

“What’s he doing here then, if the Board condemned him and the Old Man approved?” Tommy wanted to know.

Jimmylegs dropped his voice to a whisper again.

“He has right of way everywhere now because he’s become a Great Legend, the same as the Old Man and Davy Jones, and Casey Jones and Mother Carey. He comes here when he’s resting up between voyages while his Phantom Crew is careening his Phantom Ship. No one’s allowed to talk to him.”

“Have you any other Great Legends?” said Tommy, a little scared.

“Oh, yes, there’s quite a number. It’s as high as you can go. Every one has to approve of you before you can become that. There’s the Midnight Leadsman. His captain kept him in the chains at the hand lead until he froze to death, but he’s a good Great Legend and is allowed to board vessels in danger and call out the depths to the officers. But he has to stop after midnight.”

“So I’ve heard,” said Tommy shivering, and called for a mug of rum to brace him up.

“Then there’s the Swimmer,” Jimmylegs went on. “Follow ships, mostly whalers that kill calves and mother whales which is against the Unwritten Law. He was a Finn and his shipmates threw him overboard, but he wouldn’t drown. He’s a bad Great Legend because he pulls the caulking out of ships’ seams until they sink. He’s dying out now though since steel hulls came in. I did hear there was a new Great Legend growin’ up about a Trimmer, a coal-passer who hanged himself in a ship’s bunker. But you’ll have to ask Casey Jones about the rights of the matter. That new Great Legend came here once but only the steamship men could see him. Would you like to eat?”

Tommy having admitted he was hungry, Jimmylegs took him to the other end of the great house where stove pipes decorated with Spanish half-hitching stuck up from the roof. Men attired in white aprons and white caps moved about.

“They are the Good Cooks, the men who always did their best with the grub in hand and often put a little of the main cabin grub into the focsle kits. They cook here now for the love of the thing but they can always quit. There’s a special agreement by which the Old Man has the fires kept at the same temperature all the time and there’s no heat thrown into the galley itself. You see they’ve always wanted to cook in coolness with everything to hand and here they have it. Chief stewards who sold ship’s stores and make cooks go short, and cooks who took no interest in their work and their crews, scrape pans here and wash the galley deck and are put to making complicated dishes with insufficient materials. When these dishes are done they are thrown into the fires so that bad cooks and stewards will understand the Spirit of Good Craftsmanship which will come and grieve them when they see their best efforts ruined.”

Jimmylegs sat down at another small table and Tommy dropped in a chair opposite him. An Owner came running up to serve them and he wept continuously all the time so that Tommy asked him what was the matter. He explained that it hurt him to see such good food going down the throats of seamen, but Jimmylegs gave him a bad gold piece and he went away chuckling,

“Well, you’d better get your brass-work done,” said Jimmylegs at last, pushing back his chair and getting to his feet. “It’s the custom for every New Hand to clean the bell, the handle and the ports outside the main door. The Old Man’s first job when he went to sea was cleaning the brass studs of his captain’s belt. As soon as the Ark floated Noah polished his brass navigation lights. We have never been able to find any seaman whose first job was not cleaning brass and so the thing has become a custom.

“You’re a fully signed guest of the Green now with all rights and privileges once you’ve finished the brass. If there’s anything you want to know or want brought just call for a Passenger. The Pirate at the door will give you the brick-dust and oil and the Bosun’s chair by which you reach the bell. I’ve got to be off to take around a skipper and mate from a Lowestoft boat that went down this morning. Good-by.”

“Good-by, sir,” said Tommy, getting up and bowing. “And thank you very much.”

Jimmylegs stalked off and Tommy sat down again, feeling rather lonely but yet pleased that he was in such a pleasant place. He decided he’d go over and have a talk with Sir Francis Drake and Paul Jones and a few others he knew had been quite great seamen in their day. But he’d better get his brass finished first. He looked around but no one was near enough for him to ask questions of, so he hesitatingly lifted his voice and called—

“Passenger!”

Instantly there ran to his side a queer looking, inquisitive little man dressed in a tweed suit with a tweed cap and wearing slung at his side a camera in a leather case. He also carried a tightly rolled umbrella, and this he handed to Tommy who took it with some diffidence.

“I can’t answer questions unless you poke me first,” explained the Passenger.

“Good Lord,” said Tommy, “this is the most pleasure I’ve found so far!”

He poked the Passenger vigorously in the ribs as he had so often been poked himself. The Passenger squirmed and gasped, but forced a smile.

“Now,” said Tommy, leaning back in his chair, “what are you doing here? You’re not a sailor.”

“No, sir, not at all, sir,” said the Passenger civilly. “But the moderns who came from the liners demanded our presence so they could ask all the questions we had asked them. We belonged to Old Nick but he exchanged us for two marines each.”

“I see,” said Tommy. “That’s a good idea.” He stabbed the Passenger in the ribs again. “Well, show me the way out— I’ve got to polish the brasswork.”

“Oh, you’re a newcomer,” gasped the Passenger, a subtle change coming over him. “Don’t know where anything is, I suppose, and intending to make my life miserable. Well, come along.”

“Report ’im. I ’eard ’im. He was insolent,” said a gruff voice. Tommy turned and saw that a burly, bewhiskered old seaman had stopped and was glaring at the Passenger. “Report ’im to th’ Old Man an’ ’ave ’im logged.”

“Oh no, no!” squeaked the Passenger, his face paling. “That means a public reprimand. No harm intended, sir, I assure you. Just my manner of speaking.”

The burly seaman grunted and moved on repeating, “Report ’im to th’ Old Man,” and Tommy chuckled and poked out with the umbrella again. The Passenger gasped and forced himself to smile again.

Tommy got up and followed his guide along the great deck until they came to a gangway that turned off. Let in one bulkhead was a big space arranged like a regular locker, inclosed in front with glass, and inside there was a broad table on which various things rested.

“What’s this?” asked Tommy, poking his Passenger in the ribs.

“Oh, that’s the museum, sir. Those things are the things sailors hear of and talk about and never see. That big key there is the Key of the Keelson. That little key is the Key of the Compass. The slush pot filled with tallow is what they use to Grease the Rudder.”

“What’s that short piece of Samson line?”

“That’s a small length of the Line of the Equator, sir, which ships bump over and break every time they cross. There’s a watch constantly at work splicing it and Davy Jones has his very worst offenders tarring it down. That length of immense hawser to the right, sir, is part of the hawser of the big ship that scraped through the Straits of Dover and rubbed the cliffs of England and France white. She was an immense ship, sir— too big for the museum. She took seven years to tack and the wheel relief was a week walking from the focsle to the poop.”

“There’s something black and all rucked up at the edges,” Tommy observed, peering closely.

“That’s the Captain’s Shadow that froze to the deck one winter in Nome. Every sailor’s heard of that. They had to pry it up with bars. That’s what rucked up the edges. Beside it is the frozen flame of the lamp that was on the same voyage. They couldn’t blow it out so they broke the flame off.”

“What’s that big empty picture-frame for?” asked Tommy when he had digested the information given.

“That’s for the photograph of a Good Owner, sir. They did try to make up some sort of picture to give an idea what he would look like but none of the guests could conceive of a Good Owner so the frame stays empty. Over in the corner there is the famous Self-Scrubbing Broom and coiled over that peg on the bulkhead is the Self-Swinging Hand Lead. That white piece of blank paper, sir, is a list of Honest Slop-Chest Prices.”

“What’s the idea of the big plate?”

“Something new, sir. The moderns put that there to hold the Great Purpose and the Friendly Guidance the Seamen’s Missions are always talking about while they collect half of the fines the focsle pays into the log book. That tumbler beside the plate was put there by the moderns too, sir, to hold the Gratitude of the People as soon as it can be found.”

“Very interesting,” said Tommy when all had been pointed out and explained. “Now I must really go and get my brass-work done.”

“Tommy Lawn! Tommy Lawn!” a voice began to bellow and there came stumping down the gangway a little bent old man with fierce eyes and a face as wrinkled as an old shoe. He had one leg chopped off short at the knee and from there down he wore a wooden stump. There was a red handkerchief tied over his head and his earrings were big enough to run a curtain on. He wore a broad leather belt, studded with silver bosses, into which was thrust a long wicked looking curved knife.

“I’m the Keeper of the Lost Ships!” he bellowed shaking his skinny fists. “And you’re Tommy Lawn, eh? The Bramcar wasn’t due in for a year yet and I’ve had t’ move over a couple o’ galleons and a bireme t’ make room. I won’t ’ave this interfering. What d’ye know about it? It throws a ’ole year’s work outa kilter. Wot d’ye know about it, hey?”

He thrust his contorted face into Tommy’s and scowled.

“Excuse me,” put in the Passenger. “But if you’ll poke me I can explain.”

“Explain!” howled the Keeper of the Lost Ships. “What’s to explain? Next year’s space ain’t prepared an’ I had t’ move two galleons an’ a bireme. I tell you they were most annoyed. All those centuries in one spot an’ I ’ad t’ move ’em fer a lousy, stinking modern tin can—”

“Tin can yourself!” snapped Tommy Lawn rudely. “She was a fine ship and I’m ready to fight if you’ve got anything to say otherwise.” He poked the Passenger in the ribs and added, “Go on and explain if you can.”

“It was Casey Jones’ fault,” hurriedly panted the Passenger. “His engineer gentlemen were short-handed and couldn’t hold the ice. It came south before it was due. It’s really quite simple—”

“Simple? Simple?” howled the Keeper of the Lost Ships. “The bireme’s appealed to the Board and if they rule in her favor I’ll have to shift everything back again.” He nearly wept. “Simple! Simple!” He pulled out his knife and started after the Passenger who hopped nimbly out of the way, snatched his umbrella from Tommy’s hand and started to run down the gangway, the Keeper of the Lost Ships in hot pursuit.

Tommy stood there laughing and then it occurred to him that he hadn’t yet found the way to the door where the Pirate was, to get his brick-dust and oil, so he started to run after the Passenger and his pursuer, calling at the top of his voice. He tripped over something and his head hit the bulkhead and lights blurred before his eyes, revolved, growing purple and then red and then dying in blackness. Some one was shaking him—

“ARE YOU all right?” said a voice and Tommy looked up and saw the stars shining above. He was in a ship’s boat, dripping wet and icy cold and there was a taste of brandy in his mouth. “Just got you on the boathook in time.” He recognized the mate’s voice. “You’d have been a goner ’nother half second. Here, sit up and drink some more. There’s a fishing schooner beating about over yonder waiting to pick us up.”

___________________

10: Pod Flits

George Allan England

1877-1936

The All-Story August 1909

A tale of the two indomitable vagrant con-men, Pod and Bender

TO Pod Slattery, sitting dejected in his narrow cell in the Ponkapog county jail, the rural turnkey delivered a newspaper which had been sent him, so its wrapper said, by one P. Benyon, New York City.

The wrapper was no longer on it, for Warden Tibbetts had ripped it off preparatory to inspecting the paper, lest in its bulk be hidden some metal tool, some "dope" or other contraband. But Tibbetts had discovered nothing. Though he had scanned the whole paper, sheet by sheet, he had found it innocent of guile. A certain blue-penciled article had, indeed, arrested his suspicious eye, but it had been merely an account of a riot at Tammany Hall.

"Nothin' to object to here," he had said to Turnkey Bartlett. "Let him have it."

So Pod got the paper. Wearily he unfolded it. No avid reader, Pod. He was pining for the open, now that spring was coming over the hill— longing for the good green Fields of Graft, where erstwhile he and Bender had so joyously disported, before that misplay of the Old Homestead had combined with his own defective sprinting qualities to land him in the place of tin spoons, striped clothing, and barred windows.

"Readin'!" he scoffed disgustedly. "Who wants t' flash a lamp at readin', I'd like to know, with all those tricks just waitin' to be trumped on the outside?"

He yawned voluminously. Then his dull eye caught the blue-penciling.

"Eh? What?" he queried. "That looks like news from home!"

He read the article all through, squinting in the dim light of the cell. Then he turned the paper over and looked carefully at the back of it. He passed his fat finger over the surface. A smile broadened his good-humored face.

"Huh!" he grunted. "I guess that's what it is, all right, all right— news!"

Once more he scanned the text with minute attention, holding the paper close to his eyes with one hand, while with the other he scratched his bald spot. When he had quite finished, he held the paper up to the dull square of light which seeped in through the window from the jail yard.

Never in his life had his perceptions been more keen. Here, there, in certain letters of the print, minute holes showed, mere tiny punctures with the finest of needle-points.

Long, lovingly, Pod studied these punctures. Dawning comprehension brightened his smile. Half an hour or more he studied, by the fading light. Then he nodded, and with a sudden access of joy noiselessly slapped his leg.

He heard the pad-pad-pad of the turnkey's rubber soles coming down the corridor. Instantly he tore the paper into bits and flung it on the concrete floor.

"Huh! Who th' devil wants t' read stale news, in here?" the turnkey heard him growl disgustedly. Then came a rattling of the cell-door.

"Hey there, Bo, can't you give us somethin' that ain't green with moss?" Pod hailed.

"Shut up in there, you, or I'll report ye ! " Bartlett retorted, as, frowning, he made his way to the office.

ii

ONE WEEK from that day a book came to the Ponkapog jail addressed to Mr. William Slattery, and, this, too, reached his hands.

Warden Tibbetts, of course, looked it all through; but who could object to a series of essays on "Moral Regeneration" by the Rev. Kenneth Blair?

Pod let the turnkey see him dutifully reading the first of these essays; but that afternoon, at the early supper-hour, he "palmed" a tin spoon from the table, and took it with him to his cell.

Before the lights were all put out, at nine o'clock, he had straightened the handle of the spoon till it made a sort of blade, and had pried open the thick pasteboard back cover of the volume.

From a little cavity deftly fashioned there he withdrew a very thin tablet of some reddish substance and a tiny camel's-hair brush. These he hid under his mattress.

The book, after having carefully pressed its cover together again and rubbed the edge with pipe-ashes till the split was hidden, he stood on the little corner shelf, along with the compulsory Testament.

Next morning he chewed his day's allowance of tobacco into a strong quid and tucked it close up under his armpit, where he held it all day long. And in the quiet hour between eight and nine, when prying eyes were few, he sought out his brush and tablet.

Wetting the brush in his mouth he rubbed it on the tablet. The brush grew red.

"Anilin's the stuff, an' no miss-play, at that!" he murmured, as with deft dabs he spotted his face, neck, chest and arms with a fine red "rash." These he labored over till they were perfect.

"Tell me they ain't th' goods!" thought he. " 'Nothin' you ever learn, Bill, but what may help you some time,' my poor old mother used t' say when I was a kiddo, and right she was!

"That time I panhandled in Beantown, hung out in the Retreat on T-Wharf and got hep to the gentle a'rt of 'jiggered' arms and phony sores— say, what I learned then is the elixir now, eh? These here eruptions take the dust-microbes from none, or I'm a preacher. They'll keep me several laps in the lead over old Tibbetts, all right, till we uncover a few oddities!"

He finished his task, once more hid the tablet and the brush, then wrapped him-self in his blanket and lay down in his bunk with a low groan.

"That groan comes pretty near bein' the genuine goods," he pondered. "Fact is, the quid's beginnin' to bite. By mornin' there'll be a sick Pod in this jail, no white-powder trance about that! Well, let 'er happen. I'm ready— if Ben is!"

He snuggled the tobacco closer under his arm and composed himself to sleep.

"Gee, but I'm dizzy, now I stop to notice it!" he murmured. "There'll sure be a sick Pod by breakfast-time!"

iii

THERE WAS a sick Pod, very sick, actively and noisily sick. By midnight, sleep had quite abandoned him. By 2 a.m. his groans were echoing with unsimulated woe through the corridors of Ponkapog jail.

By three— though he made no demand for help— the night-watchman realized that oaths and threats and commands to "Dry up, in there, an' go t' sleep!" availed nothing. By three-thirty the warden himself, roused from slumber, was standing over Pod, a lantern in one hand and a clinical thermometer in the other.

He didn't intend to be fooled by any malingerer, not he!

No doctor could be had at that unholy hour, save by telephoning over to Hampton Center, eight miles away, where the county pest-house was. Judson Atkins, the jail physician, was off to a convention on hospital practise, at Rutland. Warden Tibbetts therefore officiated.

"What's th' matter with ye? hey?" he demanded, prodding the sufferer.

He had no love for this fat, quizzical prisoner of his who could, on occasion, discourse freely in the most extraordinary language on rural characteristics.

"Come, speak up, thar! What's wrong?"

Pod only groaned and heaved, wrapped the blanket round his head, and breathed heavily in staccato time.

"Won't talk, you? I think ye're tryin' t' hornswoggle me, that's what I think ! I've seed sech doin's afore. Cal'late this here thermometer will tell!"

He twitched the blanket from Pod's face, while the night-watchman stood behind him, holding the lantern, and thrust the little glass tube under the lolling tongue. Pod, sick as he really was, rolled his eyes horribly and added a little quiver to the groans.

"Thar! Now we'll see!" exclaimed Tibbetts presently, withdrawing the tube. He held it close to the lantern and squinted at it, turning it this way, then that, to catch the magnification of the mercury.

"What? One hundred an' two an' a half? An' pulse runnin' like a tarnation race-horse? Je-ru-salem! Say, Jackson, I reckon as how this here man has got somethin' crossways in his gizzard. Here, gimme that light, will ye?"

He held the lantern close to Pod's distorted face, and scanned it narrowly. A whistle escaped his puckered lips. He pulled down the blanket, ripped open Pod's coarse shirt and surveyed his fat chest, a growing fear in his eyes.

"My Lord, but I— I wish—" groaned Pod.

"Wish what, you? "

"Wish I'd— (oh, my head!)— been vaccinated 'fore I ever left New York! It— uhhh!— run out last year, my— last vaccination did!"

Warden Tibbetts dropped his lantern, crashing, to the floor, and backed away in sudden, sickening fear.

"You— you, Jackson— you've had it a'ready, ain't ye?" he gasped.

"Sure I have!" answered the watchman, gathering up the lantern just in time to save it from going out. "Twelve years ago last fall. I—"

"All right, all right!" cried Tibbetts, retreating out of the cell. "You're th' man t' see this through, not me ! I'll git a wagon. You wrap him up good an'

hustle him out o' here, P.D.Q., see? Don't take him through the office. Take him out th' back way. We got t' git him over to th' Center right off quick ! "

From well outside the place of dread he gave his orders in a tremulous voice. No more critical inspection for him!

"Gee, but it's lucky he's a coward, an' the light's poor!" reflected Pod, between groans.

All up and down the dark corridor bunks were creaking, cell-doors rattling, lugubrious voices asking :

"What's th' row? Somebody dyin'? Hey, Bo, put us wise."

Somebody answered: "Smallpox!" and a general gasp pervaded the night air.

"Git him out! Hurry! Hurry!" repeated Tibbetts, executing a well-covered retreat toward the office. Two minutes later he was rousing Big Jim Butts, the prison hostler, and ordering out the express-wagon.

"Oh, my, what you goin' t' do with me?" blubbered Pod. "You ain't goin' to— take me to th'— pest-house, are you?"

"Sure I be!" answered Jackson cheerfully.

"No! No! " protested the sick man with pitiable terror. "Not there! Any place but there! Oh, why can't you lemme die in peace, right here?"

"We ain't a worryin' none 'bout your dyin'," Jackson assured him, as he wrapped the extra blanket close about Pod's quivering form. "It's th' jail we're thinkin' of. Can't have that infested, y' see.

"Hev t' fumigate it now, as it is. Come on, now, set up. Git yer feet to th' floor. I'll help ye. You kin still walk a bit, can't ye?"

"Walk? Nah! Won't neither! No pest-house fer mine!"

In vain Jackson pleaded, urged, threatened, expostulated. Only when he had commandeered a trembling, panic-stricken prisoner, and with his help lugged the groaning, feebly struggling two hundred and eighty pounder by main force down the corridor and through the back entrance, did Pod Slattery leave the Ponkapog county jail.

iv

AWAY in the chill dark of that early April morning drove the little party, headed for Hampton Center. Big Jim Butts drove the official mare. Jackson sat beside him, spitting tobacco-juice between stray bits of conversation; and in the bottom of the wagon, tightly wrapped in two thick blankets, lay the prostrate and complaining Pod.

Warden Tibbetts did not appear to see the party off. Already with panic haste he was getting out the sulfur-candles and filling the jail with strangling, choking fumes.

The village was asleep as they drove through it at a walk. The houses were all dark. No life showed itself, save a lone, barking cur, and a matutinal chanticleer or two.

Over the frozen ruts the wagon jolted, to the accompaniment of the sick man's groaning. Out of the town it passed, and, turning to the south at the sign-boards, headed for Hampton Center.

Jackson, had he bothered to look round, might have seen his invalid reach in under the coarse shirt, withdraw something from his arm-pit, and fling it away; but Jackson saw nothing. He was too busy with reminiscences of his own small-pox siege, twelve years ago.

By the time the wagon had traversed four miles,. Pod found his health notably bettered. The absence of the poisoning quid helped him, the fresh air revived him, and a certain expectant eagerness stimulated his returning strength. He forgot, now and then, to groan.

"Sinkin', is he?" queried Big Jim Butts.

"Seems like," the watchman answered. "No matter. What th' devil do you care? We're doin' our jooty anyhow, ain't we?"

He clucked to the mare, and urged her to a lumbering trot.

Another mile passed. The road took a curve, and plunged into Babbett's Woods, on the other side of which lay Hampton.

"Dark in here, ain't it?" commented Jim, flicking his whip at an overbending spruce bough.

There came no answer, for all at once the roadside bushes crackled and in the semi-dusk Jackson and Butts saw a small, crouching man run with unsteady steps back into the woods, dodging from tree to tree as though to hide himself.

"I swow! What th' tarnation's that?" cried Jim, reining the mare to a standstill. "Sheep-thief, or hobo, or—"

"I dunno. Somethin' wrong abaout it, anyhow!" Jackson replied. "Hey, you!" he shouted. "Halt, there, in the name o' the law! "

The fugitive sank to earth and disappeared. In the dark undergrowth, they lost all sight of him.

"Shall we drive on?  asked Jim.

"Not by a gosh-blamed sight!" Jackson retorted. He was keen for laurels and promotion. "No, sirree! You wait here; I'll ketch th' cuss an' see what he's up to, anyhow."

Over the wheel he leaped, through the brushwood he crashed, and with cautious circumspection made his way toward the spot where the stranger had seemed to hide. As he went, rustling last fall's dead leaves underfoot, he called out warnings, commands, and challenges.

"Don't hurt me! Leave me be!" rose a voice from a little dell off a couple of hundred feet to the left. "I ain't done nothin' to you!"

"That's all right what you've done er ain't done," roared Jackson, suddenly emboldened by the fugitive's evident fear and weakness. "You're a s'picious character, that's what ye be! Yeou come along o' me, savvy? I arrest ye, in th' name o' the State o' Verhampshire! "

The man lay quite still, cringing and terrified. Jackson strode up to him. Big Jim, craning his neck from the wagon, could just barely make out the watchman's figure.

"Get up!" commanded Jackson, kicking him.

"Oooh! Don't, please!" begged the man. Jackson saw that he was slight, and ragged, and in apparent pain.

" 'Tain't my fault if I'm sick an' ain't got no home nor place t' go! Lemme be!"

"Sick, be ye? Let's see! Reckon yeou'll be sicker' fore I'm through with ye! "

Jackson knelt beside the prostrate form. Something flashed. The watchman, with hair-bristling fear, found himself looking right into the round, cold mouth of a blue revolver— a mouth that seemed big as a young cannon to his terrified eyes.

"What— what—?" he stammered. The fugitive sat up and with fearful earnestness exclaimed: "Make me sicker, will you? We'll see about that! Look here, you blundering yahoo, if you want to live, you do just what I tell you, now, and do it quick, see? "

"I— I— all right— what? "

"Put your two hands out here. No, closer together. There, that's right. Now hold 'em so! Shut your eyes, tight!"

There came a click, another one. Jackson felt something cold upon his wrists.

"Bracelets!" he groaned. "Gosh a'mighty, what's up?"

The slight man with the blue revolver vouchsafed no answer. All he said was:

"Now stand up against that hemlock, there. No, not that one— the other. Be quick, or— "

"All right, I will. Don't shoot, mister!"

And the erstwhile valiant one backed up with an exceeding meekness to a towering conifer. A minute later, the slight man had lashed him firmly to it with a hank of braided rope, thin rope but very strong. Then with deft speed he gagged the captive with a rough stick and some linen twine. His hands were none too tender and the twine cut Jackson's flesh, but Jackson never whimpered, for the fear of death was strong upon him.

The slight man whistled twice, a shrill note, and started toward the road.

Big Jim Butte, his suspicions well aroused that something was amiss, dropped the reins and started to clamber down from the wagon. But just as his foot touched the top of the wheel, a strange thing happened. Up from behind him rose a huge, inchoate form, vast in bulk, shedding blankets right and left. Staggering it rose, dizzy with anguish, yet terrible in determination.

Clad only in rough prison underwear, pallid, with contracted features, this apparition hurled itself on Jim, from the rear, before the driver could so much as turn. Not by dint of blows, but just with sheer impact of weight, the mighty form hurled Butts to earth, fell atop of him, then clung, crushing the very breath out of him. Jim had no wind for even a second cry of "Help!"

Help was fast coming, though not for Jim. The slight and agile man, crying: " Hold him, Pod ! Hold him!" burst out of the woods into the road, and Jim Butts, too, found himself inspecting the blue muzzle of the .44.

"You can get up now," said the slight man.

"I don't know about that," Pod answered. "Dizzy? Say! My coco's doin' a merry whirl, all right. Here, Ben, give us a flipper, will you? So, that's right!"

He leaned against the wagon, panting. Jim, gasping for breath, blinked at the revolver.

"Sma— sma— smallpox! Keep away!" he managed to hiccup. "You'll— catch it!"

" Sure, I understand," Bender assented. "Get up! Peel!"

"Huh?"

"Stand up and get your clothes off, P.D.Q., or I'll make a salt-shake out of you ! Got it?"

Utterly dazed, Big Jim arose.

Five minutes later, he too, wrapped in blankets, was standing in the woods, bound fast to a tree and gagged with his own handkerchief.

"We'll send somebody for you, before night!" was Bender's parting shot as he and Pod climbed into the wagon and with a sharp cut of the lash started the mare down the dusky road through the woods.

v

Ben drove, while Pod with haste and more agility than seemed compatible with one so fat and recently so ill, clambered into the clothes of Big Jim.

"Now you take the ribbons, Pod," said Ben. And straightway he effected his disguise by simply peeling off his ragged gear and flinging it into the woods.

Underneath, a clean, whole suit appeared. Ben drew a cap from his pocket, and the transformation was complete.

"Gee, Ben, but you're the nifty slickerine!" commented Pod with wonderment. "We've sure got the fun-ball circling now!"

"But not pocketed, as yet," Ben answered. "Remember, it's nine miles to he station at Rawline, and fast getting daylight. And this whole county a spider-web of rural telephones. Don't forget that! "

"You mean—"

" I mean that when the patient don't arrive at Hampton pest-house, as he ought to, now, inside of half an hour or so, there'll be doings. Tibbetts has notified 'em you're coming, of course. You see what's due to arrive, all right ! If we romp home in the lead, it'll be no fault of theirs!"

"True for you. Shall we duck th' buggy and beat it on foot?"

"Forget it ! I've got something down on the dope-sheet worth ten of that. Just you wait and keep the optics skinned! Say, but it worked, didn't it, eh? Oh, a pip! All fitted together like a jig-saw puzzle. Tibbetts, ha! ha!"

"Took th' hook, line, sinker, pole an' all. Scared green, too. Did a quick reverse when he saw the spots."

"Don't blame him. Slickest make-up ever. So smooth it took all curves without a jar— except to Tibb & Co. There's more show-me happenings, stamped with the hap-brand, too, dated to arrive. Just wait!"

Joyfully discussing things past, present, future, they drove on and on at the mare's best speed. Half a mile from the scene of the hold-up they passed a farmer driving in with milk to Hampton. He eyed them keenly, but did not molest them.

"Hang this dawn-stunt!" growled Pod. "If it was only midnight, now—! Why ain't I a Joshua?"

Even in the deep woods they could see that the light was growing very strong. The sun would be up, now, any time. At a little brook running beneath the road, they paused for a drink and a wash, which served the double purpose of refreshing them and removing Pod's anilin rash.

"Quick convalescence, eh?" smiled Ben, as they once more set forward and turned into a cross-road leading over the hills to Rawlins.

"Surest thing you know!" assented Pod. "Nobody could stay sick long, with your patent get-there line o' remedies."

The woods thinned out, and finally gave place to cleared land as they kept eastward. Morning had now fully come, and with it a revival of life in farm-houses and along the road. Ben urged the old mare forward. Plain to see, he chafed under the rural scrutiny. Pod, too, was anxious.

Just outside a little settlement, which straggled down a hillside, they came to an old church set far back from the road in a grove of cypress. To the left of it stood a tumble-down hearse-house. Ben drove into the yard and reined the mare to a standstill beside this structure.

"Here we are. Get out!" he remarked. "Here's the place I picked."

Pod climbed ponderously down. He and Ben forced the door, with a couple of vigorous shoves, and peered in.

"Good! Still there!" said Ben. " You unharness. I'll run it out." He seized the shafts of the old-fashioned, solid-sided vehicle.

Presently the wagon was in the hearse-house and the hearse was hitched to the official mare. They closed the door again. Nobody had seen them— so, at least, they thought.

"Now, Pod, here's the dido I haven't put you lucid to, as yet. In you go, now, quick!"

"In? In where?"

"In there!"

"What? Me, in that cold-meat cart? With not even a window to peek out of?"

"That's the program. You're dead— of smallpox— see?"

Pod spluttered protests, but Ben stood firm. "Get in, you stiff ! What right's a cadaver to talk back, eh? Here, I'll help you up. So! Now remember, whatever happens, not a word out o' you, or it's all off!"

A minute later, Ben was on the seat, looking very lugubrious, and the hearse, weighted to the limit of its springs, was swaying and jolting out of the church-yard behind the somnolescent equine.

vi

BEN TURNED back from the settlement, back over the hill, and soon had the satisfaction of seeing the last of the church-spire with the morning sun gilding its tip. Down the first cross-road running east he turned, and urged the mare into a trot.

The hearse bounced and rocked, yawing heavily into the ruts and coming up into the wind, as it were, with a strong list as its ponderous cargo shifted. A groan, now and then, issued from the stuffy box, but Ben rapped on its top with his whip-handle, commanding silence. Farmhouses were scattered all along the road, and he could not afford to risk such a luxury on Pod's part as groaning.

They had proceeded a couple of miles, and already Ben's spirits were rising high— for the railroad now lay less than an hour's travel ahead, and with this change of equipage all. chances seemed in their favor— when a disconcerting set-back brought the frowns to the driver's keen face.

They were just passing a farm, Ben driving decorously, with hat pulled low over his eyes, when a gaunt woman appeared at the door of a wood-shed and scanned the hearse with knitted brows and hand on hip. There were telephone-wires leading into the house.

"Cy! Cy!" Ben heard her call. "Come here, quick!"

Ben kept his pose and never so much as jerked a rein, but his heart leaped. A man appeared in the doorway.

"I snum ef it ain't!" Ben heard him say, in answer to some inaudible remark of the woman's. "I'll hook up, an' see!

"Oh, you'll see, will you?" thought Ben. He had passed, now, out of sight of the house, so he lashed the mare to a sharp trot.

"Somebody must be wise," he thought. "Somebody must have piped the game. And curse these rural telephones for gossip! Well, if we've got to do the dash, we've got to do it, that's all. Come on, there, come!" Once more the whiplash whistled.

Ben felt that the true character of his freight was still quite unsuspected. Surely the time had been too short for the whole truth to leak ; but none the less, if he were suspected merely of stealing the settlement hearse, that would bring on most fatal complications.

"Got to beat it, that's all!" said he. Around the bends he drove at a good lick, the old hearse creaking, jolting and careering heavily. A long hill, he saw, lay before him, down into the valley at whose lower end lay Rawlins, the railroad, deliverance. He thanked his stars for the long hill. That would speed him half a mile or more on his way. Vigorously he laid on the whip; the old mare kicked up her heels and hit the grit in earnest.

And now the hearse lunged into a mad career. Loose rocks and gravel flew, dust rose in the morning sunlight, springs complained and loose spokes rattled.

Every "thank-you-ma'am" sent the crazy rattletrap bounding into air, to come down aslew and right itself with wild, eccentric gyrations.

The pace quickened. The old hearse, freighted as never before, hurled itself down the hill, devouring space, faster and faster as it neared the bottom.

Ben, laughing aloud, laying on the whip where it would do the most good, glanced back. His laughter ceased, and a strong word filled his mouth. Behind him, just topping the hill some half a mile in the rear, plainly visible against the sky-line, he caught sight of a pursuing wagon. He saw the driver's arm rise, fall, and knew the rod was nowise being spared.

"Go it, Cresceus!" he shouted to the now terrified mare, and rained down blows.

The hearse struck a hummock. Something went Smash! and shrill cries rang out— wild, inarticulate cries. Ben, hauling vainly on the ribbons, looked round. He saw the roadway strewn with boards, ascatter.

"Good Lord! The bottom's out!" he cried. " Pod's running, in the hearse ! "

Then, as he looked, a huge and rotund figure fell astern, rolled, ricocheted, sprawled, bounced, and came to rest. It struggled up and lunged into a staggering run after the fleeing equipage, with wild yells, dusty, disheveled.

"Whoa, Emma! Whoa! " roared Ben, jerking the reins savagely. The mare obeyed. Slower and, slower the hearse went, then stopped still.

Ben jumped from the seat and ran back.

"Hurt?" he cried.

"Hurt, nothin'! But say— what—"

"Cut the questions, Pod! They're after us! We've got to make a diversion of some sort, and hike across-lots! Hear that?"

He held up a warning finger. Pod listened, panting. Far up the hill, out of sight around its sweep, came a rattle of loose stones.

"Yaps coming! Be here in three-minutes! Quick, that hay!"

Ben pointed at a lop-sided old haystack by the roadside. "Quick! Stuff the hearse!"

Without waiting for explanations, he dived for the stack and came back with a heaping armful. Pod, questioning not, imitated him. Into the hearse they crammed it. Enough bottom-boards remained to hold it in its place.

"Now, a match! Hurry! Hurry!"

The match went Fsss! Ben thrust it into the hay. A tiny flame leaped up, then thickened and threw out yellow smoke.

"All right, let 'er go!" cried Ben. "Duck for the woods ! "

He gave the mare a fierce, final cut of the lash.

"Get up! Go on there, you!" he shouted, and kicked her in the ribs. She, terrified beyond all measure, leaped into a wild run.

Flaming like a meteor, with a long, dense trail of smoke streaming behind, the blazing apparition hurled itself into the valley.

"Down! Down!" cried Bender, seizing Pod and hauling him behind a tangled growth of birch and hardhack.

Barely hidden from sight of the road, they heard the dash and rattle of their pursuer's wagon. Then came another, and a third. Profane, astonished yells rose on the air.

"Hell's loose! Thar goes— th' fust load— naow!" a high-pitched nasal voice shouted in mingled fear and amaze.

Quite still lay Pod and Ben. No more wagons passed. Gradually peace descended on the spring landscape.

"Come on, Bo, let's beat it for the uncut!" chuckled Pod, at length.

"Right-o. I'm with you!" answered Ben.

They got cautiously to their feet and started for the woods which lay a quarter of a mile back of the road.

"That'll hold 'em for an hour or two, that Hell-buggy will," grinned the ex-invalid.

"Longer than that," Ben opined, "or I don't know the Jay psychology. And by that time, let 'em find us— if they can!

"There's other stations besides Rawlins, and other south-bound night freights besides the one that stops there. Give us a freight and the two phony-cards I've got in my pocket, and—"

" And it's Broadway for ours, a one best bet!" exclaimed the radiant Pod as they disappeared into the sheltering forest.

________________

11: The Letter With The Black Seal

John K. Leys

1847–1909

Telegraph (Brisbane) 15 Nov 1904

I STOPPED a moment to allow the lady to pass to her carriage, and idly glanced at her. I saw a pale pretty face with a scared, anxious look on it. She did not enter the cab, though the cabman stood holding the door open for her, but paused, looking this way and that, as if looking for someone. In her hand she held a letter addressed, and stamped, ready for posting. It was singular in this respect, that although it was not a black-bordered envelope, it was scaled with a great seal of black wax.

As the lady paused, hesitating, I became aware of a man advancing from a hansom which he had in waiting at the opposite side of the street, he came across with long strides that carried him swiftly over the ground, and there was a look of determination in his face. He was advancing straight for the girl, and she stood stock still, as if fascinated.

I had not moved. I was standing near her loft hand, slightly behind her. As lie came nearer he fixed her with his eye, and his eye had a steely gleam in it that made the girl's cheek turn yet paler.

"I will this, if you please," he said, suddenly stretching out his hand to take the black-sealed letter. She seemed like one paralyzed. She did not move till his fingers had all but closed on the letter.

"Oh, no! no!" she cried, springing back a foot or two, and with a swift movement, she carried the hand that held the letter round to her back. In stepping back she nearly trod on me, and seemed to perceive me for the first time.

"Will you take this? Will you post it for me?" she cried, breathlessly.

"Certainly, madam," I said, taking the letter as I spoke.

The pallid little face brightened wonderfully. "I feel sure I can trust you," she said, and with that she stepped into the carriage and disappeared.

"Now, young man, hand over that letter! I am a detective officer, and if you post that letter you will he aiding and abetting a felony. Hand it over at once, or it will he worse for you."

I had never intended to give him the letter, but if I had so intended, this style of address would have made me change my mind.

"My good man," I said, in the loftiest manner I could assume, "you don't seem to be aware that you are talking rank nonsense. I know as little of the contents of the letter as (I imagine) you do. In any case, as the lady trusted me to post the letter I mean to follow her instructions."

I tightened my grip on the letter as I spoke, and set out for a pillar-box that I had espied at a corner a little way along— doubtless the pillar-box the lady had been looking for.

The detective followed close behind me, and I will admit that I felt considerable nervousness as to the issue of the adventure. The officer was a much larger and stronger man than I. If he were to snatch the letter from my hand, or even to collar me and take it from me by force, what could I do to prevent it?

No policeman, I felt sure, would arrest the detective; and of what use would after-complaints be when the mischief was done? If an important arrest were effected, would not the authorities be apt to look with lenient eyes on the illegality which had succeeded? Yet my pride prevented my putting the letter into my pocket, or hurrying my pace in the least. I relied on the instinctive habit of obeying the law and keeping strictly within his legal rights,  which is the glory of the British policeman. And I was not disappointed. Of warnings and threats I had plenty, but of active interference not a sign. A few seconds more, and I had gained the pillar-box and slipped the letter within the square, red-lipped mouth that was open to receive it.

Turning half round I made the officer all ironical bow, at the same time offering to give him my name and address.

"If I have been making myself an accessory in a felony you ought to have them, you know," I said; but the man merely frowned; and I went down the street, the detective following a few paces behind. His heavy footfall struck on my ear at regular intervals, as the street was a quiet one. After a time' I became conscious that I heard it no longer.

Turning round I found that the detective was no longer visible, and at the same time I noticed that the pillar-box was not now in sight.

"Surely," I said to myself, "the man cannot be meditating an attack on the postman? That would be carrying zeal quite too far."

Having nothing particular to do that afternoon I thought I would see if the Officer was really watching the pillar-box, and strolled back the way I had come. I was just in time.

Right in front of me was the burly form of the detective. He was marching straight for the pillar-box. And some yards on the other side of the pillar-box was the postman— a slight young fellow, carrying his canvas sack over his shoulder. The detective slowed down in his walk so as to allow the postman to reach the pillar-box first, and I slowed down in a corresponding degree.

The postman, answering the detective's "good-day" with a nod, proceeded to unlock the receptacle in which the letters were lying, and having done so he folded back the upper part of his sack and raised it on his knee, so as to shovel the letters more conveniently into it. He took out a handful of letters and deposited them in the bottom of the sack, the letter with the black seal lying conspicuously on the top of the others.

"I say, do you see that?" asked the officer, touching the postman lightly on the shoulder with his right hand and then pointing up the street with the same hand. As luck would have it, a little incident— a cook kissing her hand to a milkman or something of that kind— was taking place a few yards away, and the postman turned an amused glance in that direction. In that instant the detective had dexterously removed the letter with the black seal from the heap on which it was tying, and held it behind his back.

The moment the postman's eyes were on his work again I stepped up noiselessly, twitched the letter out of the detective's hand, and saying loudly, "Here's another one for you, postman," I dropped it into the bag, as if it had been a letter of my own which I had just brought to post. Before the detective could say a word the postman had twisted the neck of his sack round and flung it over his shoulder.

The letter was as far removed from the detective as if it had been in another continent. The postman went off whistling, but the detective stood stock still. His massive race was fiery red. He was speechless with rage.

"Come now," I said, "don't hear malice. You know if I had liked I could have, accused you of stealing that letter from His Majesty's Postmaster-General, which would have been a great deal worse for you."

The man's rage died away, and lie heaved a sigh, half of regret, half of resignation.

"I don't know that I wouldn't rather you had done that, sir," he said ruefully, and in a tone very different from the tone of professional arrogance in which he had addressed me a short time before. Then he added, as if speaking to himself, "My cottage on the banks of the Thames is a dream of the past now."

"I am sorry to hear that, said I, "but seeing that your dream could only be realized at the cost of the peace of mind of the charming young lady who handed me that letter, I'm not altogether grieved for the postponement. But I have no doubt that a man like you will soon realize so reasonable an ambition."

The officer seemed annoyed that he had allowed his private feelings to appear on the surface, and my poor little compliment did nothing to mollify him.

"Let me tell you this, sir," he said, with a return to his earlier manner, "that if my information is correct, you have this day helped one of the greatest scoundrels in England to escape. If I had even caught sight of the address on that letter—!"

"Oh, better luck next time," I cried. "Suppose we have a drink?"

"Well, sir, I don't know that, it matters particularly what I do just at present," said the detective gloomily, as he followed me in the direction of a house of refreshment.

Before we parted the detective had told me why he was so anxious to finger the letter which I had twice filched from his grasp. There had lately been a great and successful swindle— forged hank bills to the value of fifty or sixty thousand pounds had been discounted. The detectives had failed in arresting the principal criminals, but they had traced the engraver, and discovered him to be a man of the name of Wensleydale, living alone in a poor district of London. By some means or other the man had heard of the intended arrest, and had disappeared. The only hope of the police lay in tracing him by means of his daughter, who was a governess in a family in the West End of London. She was his only relative, and as Wensleydale had not much money at the time of his flight it was tolerably certain that before long his daughter would send him some.

"We kept a close watch on the young lady, you may be sure," went on the detective. "We found out where her employer, Sir Walton Merivale, keeps his banking account, and got word sent to us by the bank manager as soon as a cheque bearing Miss Wensleydale's endorsement was presented for payment. As soon as that was done we knew that she must be in funds, and we guessed that she would try to send a few pounds to her old vagabond of a father. We had a man on duty at the local post office, and our hope was that she would take a post office order, in which case, of course, we would have got the name of the town where he is to be found. But luck was against me. She took postal orders, and I made up my mind that I would have a sight of the address on the letter I knew she would write. And I would have succeeded, too, but for you! We got round the schoolroom maid at Sir Walton's, but she could do nothing for us. Miss Wensleydale, she said, always posted her own letters. So I kept a very strict watch in the street.

"This morning the governess went on the carriage with the kids to call on some old lady— a relative, I suppose. I watched the door, as a terrier watches a rat-hole, and sure enough, when she came out she had the letter in her hand ready to post.  I should have had it in another half second, sir, if you hadn't interfered— and I hope," he added, with professional sternness, "that you won't interfere if such a case should occur again."

"That is far from likely," said I, "but if it should happen I will bear your advice in mind."

"You would do well' to do so, for it is not every officer who might see his way to dealing with you as leniently as I have done."

I am afraid I received this warning with less respect than the detective thought it deserved, for he finished his glass rather hurriedly and left the place.

As for me, I did not pretend to myself that I was sorry that the engraver had escaped. I was young, very young, and (I am afraid) very susceptible. The beauty and the evident distress of the girl who had given me the letter had made a strong impression on my imagination, if not on my heart. I had now learned that she was friendless, and in trouble, and I was glad to think that I had shielded her from a yet greater sorrow.

One evening, some twelve months later, I was going home from business by the underground railway rather late, and as I was unwilling to miss a train I jumped into one that was just leaving the station. The carriage was a third-class one, and it was not till we had passed several stations that I noticed a poorly dressed girl in the farthest corner. Her face was not familiar to me, hut I thought I had seen it before.

At last our eyes met, and I knew her. It was the girl who had given me the letter. Taking advantage of the rapid thinning of the crowd of passengers, I moved opposite to her, and raising my hat said,

"I once had the opportunity of doing you a small service— of posting a letter for you. I hope it reached its destination."

As soon as I began to speak she turned a ghastly white, but she managed to stammer out a few words of thanks, and said that the letter had been safely delivered. The train drew up at a station, and she alighted. Following an uncontrollable impulse, I jumped out after her, and offered to carry her basket. This she would not allow. It was only too evident that she wanted to be rid of me. But every word she spoke riveted the chains more securely about me. I was, to say it in a word, over head and ears in love with her; and the thought of allowing her to drift away from me on the shoreless ocean of London life was intolerable.

There seemed to he only one way, and that way I took. Walking at her side, I told her in so many words that she must have me either for her friend or her enemy. I told her that I knew her secret, and begged her to let me consider it as my own, assuring her that I would guard it with my life.

This somewhat reassured her, and to clinch the matter I thought it best to toll how I had taken the letter on which so much depended out of the very fingers of the detective officer, and tossed it back into the postman's bag. This fairly broke down her reserve.

She cried a little and thanked me warmly; and then she told me that the inquiries of the detective had had the effect of bringing her father's misfortune to the knowledge of Lady Merivale, who promptly sent her about her business.

It was impossible to obtain further employment in teaching, as the cause of her leaving Lady Merivale's could not be made known— and she had been forced to take such manual labour as she could get. By the time she had finished her story we had reached Mm house in which she and her father lived. They were very poor, because he did not dare to work at his trade, except in doing odd jobs of humble description. Nora was at work in a laundry— and it was killing her.

My wooing was longer perhaps than it need have been. I was afraid of seeming to take advantage of the girl's poverty. Though far from being a rich man, I was rich compared to her. It was old Wensleydale— rather a stupid old fellow, as innocent as a baby— who made a way for me. He was assuring me one night, for the twentieth time, that he had no conception that the bills he had engraved were to be used for a fraudulent purpose, and telling me with tears that Nora felt herself still under a ban— under a perpetual disgrace.

So I waited for her on the stairs that I evening, to let her know just how I felt I about it. And I think there is no more to tell.

_________________

12: Proof of the Pudding

Aidan De Brune.

World's News (Sydney) 8 July 1931

These stories by Aidan De Brune were published under the anonymous pseudonym "A.D.B.", presumably because a serial by Aidan De Brune was being published in the same weekly paper at the same time.

"TROUBLE" voyaged on board the Nancy Lee— and in this instance "trouble" bore the alias of Tod Jollings, rated chief mate.

The "Nancy Lee" was a squat, sea-smothering steamer tramp of about 800 tons burden. Ostensibly registered at San Francisco, she professed to trade through the Islands, with Sydney as her temporary headquarters. Joe Porter, Customs inspector with a roving commission along the waterfront for the suppression of illicit drug traffic, hinted at dark and unpleasant happenings whenever the "Nancy Lee" should dare to poke her ugly, high-prowed beak into her port of registry.

Certainly Captain Angus McGregor and his crew were tough— but none so tough as Tod Jollings, the first mate. A big, burly man in the middle thirties, with a shock of light red hair, his light-blue eyes were invariably set in a stare of hostility.

The Nancy Lee had been out from Sydney ninety-three days on this voyage. Her manifest declared that she was bound for the southern groups of the Islands— yet, peculiarly, the log of the Maritura, an English-Australian mailboat, reported that three days out of Colombo a tramp steamer bearing a remarkable resemblance to the Nancy Lee had been sighted, and that steamer neither answered signals nor flew a flag.

Altogether the Nancy Lee and her crew were under suspicion; yet of those berthed forward Joe Feng, the cook, was the only man who had sailed in her on previous voyages. Joe Feng held his berth because of his ability at plum-duff— and mate Jollings loved plum-duff. For that reason, perhaps, the Chinese was exempt from the continued hazing to which the mate subjected the crew. Joe Feng was treated with almost respect; more, of all the stores shipped at any port, those pertaining to the manufacture of plum-duff were alone above suspicion.

This voyage of the Nancy Lee had been remarkable by reason of the hazing to which mate Jollings subjected the men. Some unknown circumstance had upset Jollings's temper, a few days out from Sydney; he had not recovered it when the vessel pointed her prow homewards. The men were sullen. Ugly looks were cast at the mate— behind his back— yet there were those among the crew who might have stood up to him in fair fight with a chance of success. But that would have been logged! "mutiny."

The mutterings increased as the days wore by. Trade had not been good; the Nancy Lee's hold was barely half-filled— and the crew was on shares. More than one seaman envied Bert Dollard— but never within hearing of the mate.

Dollard had disappeared while the ship lay off Suva Bay. He was a meek, inoffensive little man; born and bred in Sydney— a city in which he had also married. A "rat" of a man, who lived continually under the mate's displeasure. The crew swore that he could not swim; yet communication between the ship and the shore, while the Nancy Lee lay off Suva, was entirely by the ship's boats. Dollard had not gone ashore by that means. For some fancied, or real, neglect of duty Jollings had stopped his shore leave.

In the forecastle, after lights-out, muttered speculations were rife concerning Bert's fate. There were those who stated that Jollings had tossed the little man to the sharks. A large majority of the crew speculated as to what. Mrs. Dollard would say when the ship reached Sydney and she found it did not carry her Bert.

"Big an' ugly as 'e is, I wouldn't be in 'is shoes when we's tied up," muttered Sam Smutts as he took over the wheel one evening from Fred Paton. "Bert's missus'll be there, an' when she 'ears there's no Bert an' no money "

Joltings caught Joe Feng bending and kicked him soundly.

The sentence was not finished. Fred guessed the unspoken words.

"Ain't 'e awful!" For a moment he lingered beside his mate. "'E even kicked Joe Feng to-day."

"No?" Awe strained Sam's voice.

"'E did! Feng was bendin' down jest outside 'is door as 'e comes out, and 'e— 'e caught 'im bendin'. See? I nearly larfed—only it ain't wise ter larf at a Chink when 'e gets th' leather. Feng nearly rammed th' ole man's cabin door wi' 'is 'ead, an' I caught 'is eye. I wouldn't be in th' mate's shoes fer "

Feng's rainbow eye became a chronic subject of conversation among the crew. They watched— and waited; yet nothing happened.

"Chinks don't take that sorter thin' lyin' down," observed Sam, dictatorially. "I knows Chinks. They gets their own back— y'see!"

The evening before the ship was due at Sydney Fred took news to the forecastle.

"No?" Almost a sigh went round the group gathered. Bill Warne's voice rose in solo. "Youse a awful liar, Fred!"

"I tell youse I 'eard 'im," Fred protested. "Not as I blame yer, Bill. I wouldn't believe it m'self if I 'adn't 'eard 'im— but 'e did. I swares it!"

"Apolergise t' a Chink?" Sam spat disgustedly. "That's killed the cat!"

The tall heads of Sydney Harbor loomed into view. A deep frown gathered on the mate's brow as the steamer made her slow way up the harbor. His frown deepened when he found that they were to tie up at Circular Quay.

Expectations were quickly realised. Within an hour of the first rope being made fast Mrs. Dollard came on board and demanded her husband.

"Skipped the ship at Suva, ma'am," reported Captain McGregor— then found work to accomplish in his cabin.

"Skipped th' ship?" Mrs. Dollard, a tall, bare-armed woman, who, but for her sex, would have made a mighty deck-hand, muttered. "I'll make 'im skip— that I will!" She turned on the mate suddenly. "Wot abart 'is pay?"

"Best see th' cap'en, Missus."

"I'll see that pay!" the lady threatened. But Captain McGregor was unapproachable. His cabin door was locked. All messages brought back replied that the captain was busy— and references to the mate. Jollings was uninformative.

Mrs. Dollard was not easily evaded. Despite hints and direct orders she lingered on board, talking to what members of the crew she could corner. Within half an hour she approached Jollings again.

"Where's my Bert?" she demanded, arms akimbo.

"Jumped the ship at Suva," the mate answered with, for him, unparalleled civility.

"That's a lie!" The lady thrust her face at the mate. "Where's— me— Bert?"

Jollings tried to turn away, but Mrs. Dollard had him cornered.

"In th' 'arbor at Suva," she continued, not waiting for an answer. "Yer 'azed an' 'azed 'im. an' then threw 'im ter th' sharks."

"That's a lie!" The mate spoke heatedly.

"Is it?" For moments the woman glowered at the mate, then marched off the ship, Jollings shrugged. Yet, uneasily, through the rest of the day he watched the woman, who hung about the wharf.

The crew looked on with interest. Those who knew Mrs. Dollard had expected something more - dramatic. Her restraint puzzled them. They were still more puzzled at the conferences held between the mate and Joe Feng; and later between the Chinese and Mrs. Dollard.

The next day Captain McGregor and the mate stuck close to the vessel. Joe Feng was very busy in his alley.

"Plum-duff ter-day," reported Sam to his mates. He also reported a long and earnest conversation between the mate and cook, at which the former had done most of the talking— the latter confining himself to rapid nods. Towards noon Mrs. Dollard came to the vessel and went to the cook's galley. She returned ashore carrying a heavy basket. Inspector Porter met her within the shed.

"What have you got there?" He eyed the basket. Everything pertaining to the "Nancy Lee" was suspicious— to him.

"Plum-duff fer th' funeral," the lady replied promptly, opening her bag. "That cookie's th' only decent man on that boat. " 'E cooked me a plum-duff in mem'ry ov me Bert."

Porter poked at the duff. In looks, aroma, and feel, it certainly was plum-duff. He was inclined to explore further. but refrained. Gossip had reported the disagreement between the lady and the ship's officers. It was unlikely that she would help them smuggle. Grudgingly he passed her.

The midday hour came and the crew ceased work; expectant of the plum-duff that was to honor their table. Unanimously they agreed that Feng's plum-duffs were the only decent thing on board. Just as unanimously they agreed that that would be the last plum-duff they would eat on board the Nancy Lee.

The steaming, sweet-smelling dish was borne to the forecastle. Another, much smaller, went to the cabin. Ten minutes later Jollings rushed to the deck side and heaved something into the water— his face was white with anger and fear. Three bounds took him to the galley.

"Wot th' 'ell didja put in that plum-duff, you damned, blithering 'eathern," he yelled, hauling Joe Feng from the galley to the deck. "Try t' poison me, would ja?"

"Me no savee."

"Yer put sumthin 'in that plum-duff." Jollings was shaking his victim like a cat shakes a rat. "Wot was it?"

"Onlee li'lle pow'er you give. You say put in duff."

"I told you ter put that bottle of stuff in th' puddin' when you'd cooked it— th' one I was takin' ome."

"I'se put in duff." Feng lost none of his blandness.

From that Jollings could not shift him. A chance glance at the wharf showed the mate that Joe Porter was watching the scene with interest, though too far away to overhear the conversation.

With a muttered groan the mate released the cook and returned to confer with Captain McGregor. During the afternoon the news filtered around the deck that Feng would not sail again on the Nancy Lee. Yet the Chinese was not perturbed. Towards dusk he gathered his belongings into a bundle and sought the captain. He emerged from the cabin, a bland smile still on his impassive face.

Outside the wharf he chanced on Mrs. Dollard. A few words and Chinese and widow made for the tram stop and Woolloomooloo. Both were smiling, as if over a day's work well accomplished.

In McGregor's cabin mate and captain foregathered.

"Well?" queried Jollings shortly.

"Sed he mistook your orders," the captain answered shortly.

"Like 'ell 'e did.'"

"Wot didyer want t' kick 'im for?"

McGregor spoke angrily. "There wos nigh two hundred quids worth ov—"

"Shut yer trap!" the mate interrupted quickly. "Yer don't know who's outside. "An' 'e put it in th' duff! The—" The balance of the mate's remarks were quite unprintable.

IN A ROOM in Cathedral Street, Woolloomooloo, Mrs. Dollard and Joe Feng interviewed a man of Italian nationality. All three were smiling broadly as the foreigner counted over a thick wad of bank notes. As they turned to the door Mrs. Dollard faced the cook..

"Wot didja put in 'is duff, Feng?"

The bland smile slightly broadened on the Chinese face. His tones were almost benevolent as he softly murmured:

"Me giv-a lolla salt."

___________________

13: The Wedding Cake

Aidan De Brune

World's News (Sydney) 12 Aug 1931

INSPECTOR JOE PORTER leaned against a lamp-post in William Street. Few persons who knew the keen, smart "dope tracker" would have recognised him in the down-at-heel lounger who seemed to have no other object in life than to kill time.

A well-dressed man came down the street, passing the Inspector, and entered a pastry cook's shop close by. He tapped impatiently on the counter. A woman came out of the back room, and, as the man spoke briefly, she reached under the counter and brought out two buns. She placed them in a bag, handing it to the man. He gave her a banknote and she turned to the till to make change.

Only by a slight tenseness had the lounger in the street betrayed interest He had seen similar incidents happen before— at that shop. Always the buns had been paid for with a bank-note. Always two twopenny buns— and a pound note changed hands.

He had searched the shop and questioned the woman. She had given her name as Violet May. Her statement had included the facts that she was not a pastry cook, although her husband had been one; that she was the occupier of the shop and that she purchased her goods from Mackenzie and Co.. a wholesale firm.

Joe Porter's suspicions had been aroused when he traced Paul Scagalli to the shop; not once, but several times. Scagalli was a ship's steward on a European mail-boat. When in Sydney, he lived at a lodging-house in Bourke Street. Apparently he was fond of pastry— for, when on shore, he made daily purchases from Violet May.

The Inspector had no business hunting drug-runners in the city. That was the duty of the police drug-squad. But one day he had trailed Scagalli to the shop from the wharf.  He had watched him In earnest conversation with the woman. The man had left the shop without making any purchase— and Scagalli had long been under suspicion for importing illegal drugs.

Porter had referred the matter to Sergeant Williams, of the "drug-squad." A month later Williams had declared the Inspector's suspicions regarding Violet May and her shop completely unfounded. But, Porter was not satisfied. His suspicions of Scagalli had been too well founded to be lightly laid aside. He had determined to watch, himself, during his spare time.

When the man with the buns left the shop Porter, in sudden impulse, turned and followed him. Passing the man he brushed against him roughly, deftly sweeping the bag of buns from his hand. The bag burst and one of the buns rolled Into the gutter.

"Damn you! Now you can have them!" The man turned angrily, "Damned clumsy devil!"

When the' man was out of sight, Porter retrieved the buns. Quickly he broke and crumbled them. Suspiciously he miffed at them. They were entirely innocent of drugs. He dropped them into a waste receptacle.

"Too finneky to eat a bun that dropped on a clean street?" A passing constable sneered, sarcastically. "Want it handed you on a gold plate, eh?"

Porter shrugged, as he turned again to his observation post. Twice that afternoon persons entered Violet May's shop, purchasing buns and paying for them with bank-notes.

That evening, well-dressed, he entered the shop and asked for a couple of buns, offering in payment a pound note. Violet May made the change, without protest. Porter obtained a glimpse at the interior of the till. It was well stocked with coins.

"Keep a large amount of cash in the till, don't you?" he asked, casually. "Aren't you afraid of a hold-up? There was one down the road a week or so ago."

"I'm not afraid!" The woman looked at him a moment. "I've seen you before." She hesitated. "Now I remember. You searched this shop for drugs once? Didn't find any, did you? Well, what are you snooping about now for? Don't you like to see people earn an honest living?"

"An honest living— yes." The Inspector spoke significantly.

"Well?"— defiantly.

"Why do people purchase buns with bank-notes?" he asked.

"Don't know." Violet May shrugged. "I've known people give bank-notes for a sixpenny packet of cigarettes. Perhaps they want change— and that's a good way to get it."

The "dope-tracker" knew that to be true. He looked at the woman, curiously. She was good-looking, with a firm, well-rounded figure, grey-green eyes, and dull gold hair. Her expression was marred by a strange, sullen look.

"Know Scagalli?" he asked, suddenly.

"Not by name."

"Comes here quite a lot— for pastry! Middle height, black eyes and hair, round face. Always carries his hands in his trousers pockets."

Violet May shook her head. '"There's dozens like that," she said.

Mrs. May, with a queer little smile, passed it over without a word.

"He's a ship steward— but a 'dope' importer," Porter continued.

"I don't deal in drugs." The woman flared to sudden anger. She snatched a book from under the counter and flung it open before the Inspector. "That's my trade. Perhaps you'd like to run through my customers; pick out those you suspect of buying drugs, and order me not to serve them."

Curious, Porter turned the pages. He quickly saw that the woman did a good trade. Her accounts were well kept and she gave short credit.

"Well?"

The Inspector shrugged. "Look here, Mrs. May," he said, impulsively. "I'm not trying to harry you. I've got suspicions and…"

"Get facts!" the woman snapped. "You and your Scagalli!"

She went into the back room. Porter waited a moment, then, as she did not reappear, he shrugged and left the shop.

The following day he resumed his watch on the shop. Late in the afternoon one of Mackenzie's carts drove up to the shop. The man carried in a large wedding-cake shell. With Violet May's assistance he lifted it into a prominent place on the shelf behind the counter, covering it with a domed glass.

A quarter of an hour later Inspector Porter entered Mackenzie and Co.'s offices, making inquiries regarding Violet May. her trade, and the order for the wedding cake.

"Only the shell— sugar, you know, Inspector," Prank Mackenzie, the owner, laughed. "Lots of them, Violet May included, ask for the sugar-shell to be loaned them a couple of days, before they want the cake. Advertisement, you know."

"How often does she order wedding cakes?" asked the Inspector.

"Very infrequently. Three or four a year.'

The Inspector shrugged, as he left the office. Almost he decided to abandon the quest, yet he hated to confess he was defeated At the back of his mind was the certainty that Violet May and Scagalli were connected and that the connection spelt— drugs. But, something held him to his watch.

He saw the cake in the shop, on the shelf, for a couple of days. Then it disappeared. The next day the carter brought it back. Prom the manner in which he lifted it from the cart to the shop it was evident the shell now contained the cake.

A sudden attack of influenza caused overtime work among the Customs men at the wharves. Porter found he could not now devote time to Violet May— yet he did not forget her. Three months later she was recalled abruptly to his memory.

"Telephone, for you, Joe." One of his mates called across the wharf office.

"Inspector Porter?" an unfamiliar voice spoke. "Mackenzie and Co. speaking. The pastry cooks, you know. You remember you asked me to let you know when Mrs. May gave a new order for a wedding cake."

"Yes?" The Inspector spoke mechanically.

"Our carter brought in an order from her this morning." The speaker hesitated. "I hope you've dropped your suspicions of Mrs. May— a most respectable woman, I  assure you; I'd... I'd almost guarantee her!"

Porter muttered his thanks for the information and rang off. He returned to his desk, to sit, frowning thoughtfully at his papers, for long minutes. Then, with sudden decision, he swept the papers on. which he had been at work in a heap.

One was a shipping list. His eyes alighted on one line and held. The Carpentia was due in Sydney Harbor in two days.

The Carpentia! That was Scagalli's ship. He suspected the man of being a drug importer. He was a friend of Violet May's; and she had ordered a wedding cake. She had ordered a wedding-cake when last Scagalli had been in Sydney!

Now he had something tangible— yet it was only a suspicion! But, suspicions, well-founded, could be turned into facts!

He watched,. in his lounger disguise. Mackenzie's carter carry the sugar-shell into Violet May's shop the next day. Two or three times a day he passed the shop until the Carpentia entered port. Then the shell disappeared. That was early in the afternoon. Just before closing time, Mackenzie's carter drove up to the shop and carried in the wedding-cake.

An hour later Scagalli walked up to the shop door. The woman opened to his knock, leaving the door ajar behind him. They went to the counter and the man produced a parcel. She turned to the till and handed the man some money. Immediately Porter opened the door and entered the shop.

"I want that parcel," he demanded briefly.

Mrs. May, with a queer little smile, passed it over without a word. The Inspector unwrapped it hastily. It contained many yards of fine Maltese lace and the Customs' clearance. Scagalli watched the Inspector, a broad grin on his face.

"Satisfied?" the woman asked, with a sneer.

"I'm not!" Porter spoke in sudden temper. "You've beaten me, this time— you and that man, Scagalli; But I'll get you yet!"

He went from the shop, their laughter ringing in his ears. His last glance at the interior of the shop was towards the shelf where the wedding-cake stood, in all its glory.

Somehow he could not get that cake from his mind. He had seen the shell carried into the shop two days previous. It was due to be returned to the factory soon

Racing home, he changed into his lounger disguise; then spent some minutes at the telephone in earnest conversation with Sergeant Williams. He returned to the city, to pace slowly past the cake shop. Casually, he glanced in at the window. The cake was not on its shelf!

He had seen the cake in the shop late that afternoon. But it was not there now! Mackenzie's could not have sent for it, for their factory had closed long before he had followed Scagalli into the shop and had been fooled by the parcel of Maltese lace. Time and again he paced up and down before the shop, trying to puzzle out the solution of his problem. He knew much, but still there were links missing in his chain of evidence.

He turned and walked to Bourke Street, to take up a position from where he could keep watch on Scagalli's lodgings. Almost directly he arrived a man left the house, carrying a small case. Porter followed him down the street, contriving to knock against the case. It was empty, or nearly so. He returned to Bourke Street, to see Scagalli enter and leave the lodging-house several times during the evening— but at no time did he carry any parcel. About midnight the Inspector went home.

THE NEXT MORNING he was in William Street very early. Just before eight o'clock Mackenzie's carter drove up to the shop, entered and returned to his cart, carrying the sugar-shell. As he drove off Porter signalled to a man with a bicycle on the other side of the road. The man mounted and followed the cart. A couple of men crossed the road to him and, accompanied by them, he entered the shop.

"Going to search your place again, Mrs May," he remarked, briefly.

The woman shrugged. A long search and Porter discovered, at the bottom of a well-filled dustbin, a parcel of powdered crystals. These he carried into the shop. A few minutes later Scagalli was brought in by a couple of plain-clothes constables; then followed Sergeant Williams, with Mackenzie's carter. A man followed carrying a parcel that, on opening, proved to contain drugs. In shape it would exactly fit the bottom of a sugar-shell.

"How was the joke worked?" asked Williams, curiously.

"Roughly, this way. We haven't got to the bottom yet, but we will, later. Someone gets the stuff off the boat, in conjunction with Scagalli. It's carried to his lodging. During the night he gets it into Violet May's shop. But, before Scagalli arrives in Sydney Violet May orders a wedding-cake, requesting the loan of the shell, for exhibition— that's very usual. The day after Scagalli arrives, Mackenzie's carter calls for the shell, to take to his employers to fill. On the way he either delivers the parcel of drugs he finds in the shell to some agent of Scagalli's, or distributes it to runners, himself. Of course, Violet May keeps a 'wack' of the drugs for her own trade. That's the circle— one of them will squeal when we put some pressure on them!"

____________________

14: Wiles of Cho Chun

Aidan De Brune

World's News (Sydney) 2 Sep 1931

CHO HUN was a mystery, even to the white men who lived or had business in the vicinity of Colin Street. The signs on his shop indicated that he was "merchant and importer." His windows displayed a quaint collection of goods of eastern origin. His shop was surrounded by shelves carrying parcels mysteriously wrapped. On the counters and floor were bales and cases, most of them unopened.

The doors of the store were opened at seven in the morning, and remained open until late at night. During those hours Cho Hun sat on his divan at the rear of the shop, clad in rusty black Chinese robes, his hands and eyes carefully veiled. The work of the shop— the attendance on customers— fell to the lot of the one assistant, Su Mah, a youth of nondescript, weedy appearance. In the history of Chinatown, Cho Hun had never been known to wait on a customer, or take any open interest in the business.

Yet, through the long hours of the day, not one incident happening in the shop escaped those heavily veiled eyes; not one happening but was recorded on the razor-keen brain of the old, old man.

Cho Hun was reputed wealthy. How the rumor arose no one could tell. White men who had questioned Chinese on the subject had been met with non-committal answers. No Chinaman confesses to personal wealth— or that any compatriot was other than a poor struggling trader.

Inspector Joe Porter mentioned Cho Hun while in conversation with Sergeant Westerham, of the Drug Squad, one day. The Customs officer had visited Chinatown during the previous afternoon. He had peered into the dim, mysteriously smelling shops; he had watched the impassive yellow men moving about their businesses. He had become curious. In search of information he had refreshed himself at a semi-white restaurant in the quarter. The proprietor, scenting ignorance, and always ready to encourage a "mug," had been very informative.

Cho Hun had come into the conversation, and proved a fruitful subject. Porter heard tales of the man's reputed wealth— and of his widespread interest in the gardens surrounding Sydney that provide more than a fair proportion of the housewives' daily vegetables. The restaurant keeper had whispered of drug smuggling— and far, far worse things.

Environment is everything. Had those tales been brought to Joe Porter while he was engaged in his daily business on Sydney wharf side he would have scoffed, openly and loudly. Whispered in Chinatown, they assumed a strange importance. Leaving his informant, the Inspector strolled again past the low-ceilinged, dimly-lit shop; peering doubtfully in. How could the owner of that ramshackle, dusty business be a man of wealth?

Except through one source. In the Inspector's mind opium and China were inexplicably mingled. Always he devoted particular care to Chinese ships and coolie seamen. With glee he would drag to light the small opium hoards of the yellow men.

Not that the Inspector was without human sympathies. Really he was a kind, warm-hearted man. Often he turned a very blind eye on small infringements of the Customs' rules and regulations. Only with the illegal drugs did he lose all sense of proportion. Their hunting was almost his mania.

Sergeant Westerham laughed and shrugged when Porter placed before him his suspicions regarding Cho Hun. Yet, from long experience, he held silent when Porter persisted. The "Drug Squad" and Customs Department worked, mainly, in harmony— yet there was a certain jealousy. The Sergeant considered that Porter's work lay along the waterfront and on the harbor. His snooping about Chinatown was an infringement of the "Drug Squad's" territory. He heard all the Inspector had to say; and mentally decided on a careful watch. Cho Hun would always bear watching— but if the wily old Chinaman taught Porter the well-merited lesson of minding his own business, then the Sergeant would not interfere— too early.

A rumor swept through Chinatown that certain eastern-trading vessels lately arriving in Sydney Harbor had brought, as secret cargo, vast stores of opium. In time these rumors reached the Customs House. Joe Porter went on the warpath. He obtained certain, rather vague, confirmation of the rumors—and sought his chiefs. How he convinced them is not known; but he received freedom from his ordinary duties and a roving commission to trace down the illegal importation. Of facts he had only one. The Chinese seamen and coolies had, for them, vast sums of wealth to spend on the subtle delights of Chinatown.

The rumors gathered and grew, as rumors do. Inspector Porter wore an air of secrecy and great importance. He spent much of his time wandering about Colin Street and the immediate neighborhood. He was specially inquisitive regarding Cho Hun's store.

He found little evidence to support his doubts against the Chinese storekeeper. Cho Hun continued to sit, like the graven presentment of one of his gods, at the end of the shop. Su Mah continued to use vigorously the very ineffective bass-broom, and serve the few customers who sought goods. Porter's investigations made him conspicuous in a neighborhood where suspicion is very tender. In his office at police headquarters Sergeant Westerham received daily reports of the Customs officer's movements—and sometimes swore into his heavy moustache.

"Porter'll come to a bad end," prophesied Westerham one day, as he and Detective Malcolm strolled past Cho Hun's shop. "Why th'—ll he's poking his nose into things down here I can't understand."

'"Can't you?" the younger man answered gloomily. He was always gloomy when Joe Porter came up for discussion. "If you 'ad a nose like his... He couldn't keep it out of other people's business if he tried!"

The two men were passing through Colin Street, towards George Street. A few seconds and Malcolm questioned:

"What made you say that?"

'"Joe's in Cho Hun's shop, in close confab with the old Chink. Whaffor?

Without a word Malcolm retraced his steps. He rejoined his companion, a deep frown on his face.

"What's he after?" he asked inconsequently.

The Sergeant shrugged. "Think's he's putting one over on us," he laughed. "He's a couple of doors out, as it is."

Both men glanced back at the facade of a shop close by. For many months they had been suspicious regarding Ah Sun. At that time his shop was under close observation, night and day. No one— nothing— entering or leaving, but came under close police scrutiny.

Yet, in spite of police doubts, Joe Porter returned home that evening well satisfied with his day. For quite a time he had hung about Cho Hun's shop. He had made a few purchases in it of small objects he recognised, but had no great appreciation for. He had refused, abruptly, the many Eastern delicacies Su Mah continually brought under his notice. He shuddered as he surveyed them. They looked too akin to the traditional French delicacies— snails and frogs— but withered and dried. Yet one day he made a plunge. He purchased, extensively, of a delicacy that Su Mah enthusiastically recommended— a delicacy described as "all one time velly good fellel." The next day Cho Hun had broken his long silence. He had come to meet Porter, his thin, highpitched, sing-song voice rising above the noises that floated in from the street.

The Inspector had nobly responded to the Chinaman's advances. Understanding that his customer had no knowledge of Cantonese, Cho Hun changed to low voiced, courteous, flawless English. He told Porter of many strange things regarding the delicacies he sold.

The Chinaman told the Inspector of the rumors of Chinatown— of the whisper that Sergeant Westerham believed that vast stores of opium had lately come into the district. He told the Customs officer that the police officer was carefully watching Ah Sun, his customers, and premises. Very regretfully Cho Hun allowed Porter to understand that he believed his neighbor to deal in the insidious "smoke."

From that time the friendship between the old Chinaman and the Inspector grew apace. Cho Hun confided in his new white friend; he asked his advice on matters pertaining to his business— and particularly regarding his very large interests in market gardens. Joe Porter gathered that Cho Hun was not satisfied with the returns he was receiving, but that he was too old and weak to inquire into matters personally. Su Mah was but a youth, of little understanding and less experience. The conversation developed over little cups of tea, brewed and drunk in Chinese fashion. Almost without surprise the Inspector found himself committed to an inquiry into conditions and workings of the market gardens— a subject on which he was abysmally ignorant.

In the meantime Sergeant Westerham had received confirmation of the secret store of opium in Chinatown. He drew tighter the cordon he had established around Colin Street, and particularly Ah Sun's shop. For the moment things stood at a stalemate. The Chinese could not shift the valuable consignment; in spite of frequent raids Westerham could not discover it.

The next day Porter again visited Cho Hun. Before the shop stood a handsome sedan car, a Chinese chauffeur at the wheel. Cho Hun gravely explained that the car was for the convenience of his "white father," whose profound advice would be received with abject humility. With the aid of a stick and Su Mah's arm Cho Hun escorted his white friend to the waiting car. There he presented him with his credentials— a large tablet engrossed with Chinese characters.

Joe Porter enjoyed his visit of inspection— and especially the importance of the motor car and the Chinese chauffeur. He came back from the tour aghast and pained. The conditions at the garden were abnormal— the wages utterly inadequate— the housing and board awful. Joe Porter was a staunch unionist, and these things gravely hurt him. Another incident pained him. A motor-cycle "John" had deliberately searched his car while he had been on a tour of the gardens.

Cho Hun received the Inspector's report with gratifying humility. He would be favored if his "white father" would continue the good work. All should be as he directed— his reforms would be immediately adopted. Would the august Inspector allow the miserable, inadequate car to convey him to his mansion of bliss. Su Mah and the chauffeur carried quite a number of small parcels to the car.

These were left at the Porter residence— to Mrs. Porter's mingled delight and perplexity.

The next morning, early, the motor car called for Porter. A message from Cho Hun indicated that he could not allow his friend and benefactor to walk to his wretched, miserable, dirty shop. Joe Porter swelled, almost visibly. He had a glorious day; only marred by the fact that the inquisitive motor-cycle "John" again searched the car during his absence. That could not be tolerated!

He took occasion to meet Sergeant Westerham the next day. A sharp exchange of opinions occurred. Westerham scoffed at "Joseph Porter, business expert." He dared to suggest that the "Chow" was using him. In lofty supremacy the Inspector asked if the police officer thought any Chinaman could use him to distribute illegal drugs. Bluntly, Westerham stated that he believed a child in arms could use his quondam friend for any and all purposes. They parted in unfriendly moods.

Yet much that the Sergeant had spoken stuck in Porter's thoughts. That day he searched the car himself. He searched the huts at several gardens. He searched until he felt ashamed under the inscrutable eyes of the Chinese chauffeur.

Days passed. Friends of Cho Hun sought Porter's advice. They were very deferential— eloquent with material gratitude. Mrs. Porter became a warm pro-Cho Hunite. Among her friends she was gaining a big reputation for uncommon and palatable delicacies at her afternoon teas. The Inspector strode with a new importance. He felt that he held a unique and high position in Chinatown.

And—Sergeant Westerham and his men drew tighter the. cordon they had thrown around Colin Street and the neighborhood. Raids and searches were continuous. Yet, never even the shadow of a "pipe", rewarded their efforts. Almost it seemed as if Chinatown had reformed from the insidious "dream-smoke."

Suddenly came one of those rumors that sweep, inexplicably, through Asiatic colonies. Very definitely it was stated that the huge store of "mud" had been distributed. The smugglers had accomplished their task— and Chinatown suddenly showed signs of wealth.

Sergeant Westerham tried to confirm the rumors. He obtained sufficient to believe that he had once more been baffled. For that he blamed Inspector Porter.

The Customs officer heard the rumor— and from another source— Sergeant Westerham's conclusions. He grew furious. Now all his work was destroyed. If the police had left him alone, he, unaided, would have brought the investigations to success.

At this point intruded a very minor official of the Customs Department. He expressed a doubt at a private investigation instituted by one of the highest officials. The very minor official questioned, the genuineness of the "gifts" Su Mah, the chauffeur, and Cho Hun's friends had lifted into the motor car. He had suggested that not all the parcels had been taken out of the car at the door of the Porter mansion. He had suggested that the chauffeur had delivered certain of these parcels at other addresses on his way home.

The Inspector loudly scouted such suggestions. The official was a very, very minor one— with absolutely no experience. Cho Him was a high and influential Chinaman with a large horror of the "dope." Inspector Porter was an experienced and keen officer. No one could put such a double-cross... etc.... etc. very much ad libitum...

Yet the friendship between Joe Porter and Cho Hun waned. The Chinaman "forgot" to seek the advice of his white friend. Always he was pleased to see him— to entertain him with the little steaming cups of fragrant tea. But— he was now a very, very old man—so old that even the delightful conversation of his 'white father" exhausted him.

The Customs offices were not comfortable, those days, and Joe Porter sought solace on the wharves. Yet even here the story spread. Men openly asked if all the parcels had been delivered at the Porter home; had not certain parcels, of extremely doubtful contents, found their way to other— also doubtful— addresses.

What could Inspector Joe Porter do or say? In his youth he had been taught that "one should not look a gift-horse too closely in the mouth."

________________________

15: A Question of Coke

Aidan De Brune

World's News (Sydney) 23 Sep 1931

CUSTOMS-INSPECTOR JOE PORTER was not at ease. Clad in irreproachable evening dress, he was seated at a table in the Romanesque Restaurant, moodily watching the couples on the dancing floor.

Particularly his eyes followed one couple; a man and a girl. He knew the man well; Paul Scagalli, one-time of Italy, now a habitant of the underworld of Sydney, N.S.W. Scagalli had just returned from a short enjoyment of State hospitality.

The girl was different. Young, about twenty-three years of age; exceedingly blonde, with a strangely transparent complexion. She wore very little makeup— except for the vivid red of her lips. Even the inspector's masculine eye noted that her dress was no copy; it was an original of one of the kings of Parisian fashion.

What was such a girl doing with Scagalli? The inspector had first seen her that morning when the Moritovian had steamed up Sydney Harbor. Something about the girl had attracted his attention. He had watched her leave the ship, entering a taxi outside the wharf gates. Instinctively he had noted the car's number. Later in the day he had interviewed the driver, and discovered that the girl had driven-to a block of flats in Darlinghurst. The man had said that the girl had evidently been expected there; yet the flat had not been previously occupied.

Curiosity had induced him to journey to Darlinghurst that day, after he had signed off work. He had arrived outside the building just as the girl and Scagalli had emerged and entered a taxi. A little manoeuvring and he had learned that they were going to the Romanesque He had taken a taxi home, dressed quickly, and hurried to the restaurant.

Moodily watching the fox-trotting couple, he had wondered what Sergeant Westerham, of the Drug Squad, would say if he found him in that place. Westerham was intensely jealous of the Customs officials coming into the city on the trail of the drug-runners. He had openly stated that he considered the Customs officers' work ended at the wharf gates— yet did net refrain from sharply criticising their "ineptitude" in allowing so much illicit drug to get into the city.

Again Porter's thoughts went to the man and the girl. She was plainly enjoying her first evening in Sydney; glancing up smilingly at her tall, good-looking partner. From her intonation he judged her to be English. At the wharf he had managed to handle her luggage. She. was apparently well off; for her clothes were of excellent quality, and mainly recent acquisitions.

He would have passed her with but a cursory glance— an admiring glance, true, due to her beauty— but for the taxi driver's report. Why he had sought out and questioned the man he could not understand; possibly his curiosity had been awakened by some chance, unremembered word. He had become curious regarding a girl who drove straight from the ship to a prepared flat; taken for her by— whom?

He had gone to Darlinghurst out of sheer curiosity— to be staggered by the appearance of Scagalli.

Paul Scagalli! For years there had been war between the Italian and those engaged in combating the drug trade of Sydney. For years Scagalli, a known smuggler, had openly defied his department and the police. Only once he had slipped.

Now the man was again free; and almost his first acts of freedom were to welcome this girl to Sydney and take her to supper-dance at the fashionable restaurant. The presence of the man with the girl was almost conclusive evidence of her complicity in "the trade."

Something drew Porter's eyes from the couple to the door. He started slightly. Two men were entering. Beneath their correct, conventional attire he recognised Sergeant Westerham and Plain-clothes Constable Malcolm.

What was Westerham doing there? The inspector frowned. Was he, too, on the Italian's trail? It almost seemed so. As the men halted in the doorway, Scagalli and the girl, danced past them. Westerham raised his brows and muttered something to his companion, who nodded.

The men started to circle the dancing floor, preceded by an obsequious waiter. Porter waited until they were level with his table, then muttered a low greeting.

"Suffering cats!" The sergeant turned to his companion. "Look what's here?"

"Buttin' in, as usual." The inspector growled. "Well, you may as well sit here as elsewhere. Can keep an eye on the pair of you then. There's a blonde

"Seen her, boy!" Malcolm chortled. "Some girlie, eh...  and what does Mrs. Porter say?"

The inspector ignored the remark. The three men sat silent, Westerham studying the menu. At length he ordered. When the waiter was out of hearing, he leaned across the table. ,

"Jesse! Can't a man have an evening off?" The inspector simulated indignation. "Suppose you're on duty— in glad rags?"

Apparently engaged in idle conversation, the three men sat on. stealthily watching the couple. Midnight came and the girl rose, turning to her chair-back, over which hung her cloak. Scagalli sprang to her assistance. She laughed up at him as he spread the cloak over her bare shoulders: then turned to the door.

"Quick; trail them?" Porter turned to the constable. "Westerham, you remain here...."

As the man and girl moved out of sight, Porter crossed the room and seated himself at the table they had vacated. For some moments he remained motionless, then changed to Scagalli's seat.

A few minutes later he rejoined Westerham. The sergeant looked inquisitive, but Porter shook his head negatively

"Malcolm trailin' them?" he asked. Westerham nodded.

With a beckoning gesture the customs man turned to the door, followed by the sergeant. On the street, he hailed a taxi and gave the girl's address. He refused to talk during the Journey.

Outside the block of flats they found Malcolm pacing the pavement.

"What luck?" asked Porter, shortly.

"Drove her home and went in with her," the constable reported briefly. "What's the joke, Joe? You're damned mysterious this even'ng."

"Let it ride, Bill," Westerham ordered suddenly. "Joe knows, or guesses, something."

For nearly an hour the three men waited, concealed in nearby doorways. At length Scagalli appeared on the steps before the building. He glanced up and down the road, apparently looking for a taxi. One came in view and he raised his stick.

"Paul!" Porter spoke sharply from where he was concealed.

The man turned suddenly, shifting his stick to his left hand. Over that arm hung a long, dark overcoat. He looked puzzled when he found no one near him. For a moment he hesitated, then went to the taxi at the curb. As he made to enter, Malcolm sprang behind him. On the opposite side of the. car Westerham wrenched open the door and barred the way. Porter come out of his concealment and strolled to the taxi-door.

"Take him to Central, Sergeant." he said carelessly. "I'll be along in a few minutes and make the charge."

He waited until the taxi was out of sight, then made his way to the girl's flat. Half an hour later he came out, to find Malcolm waiting for him in the corridor.

"All O.K., Bill?" he asked; then at the man's answering nod: "Just entertain this little lady, Miss Treviss, until Westerham and I return. We've got the goods, all right— but she's not in it. Just one of the gang's 'dumbs'."

At Central Station he went to the room where Westerham and his prisoner waited. Without speaking Porter strode across the room and took the man's overcoat.

"Gettin' on in the world, Paul," he laughed confidently. "Business good at Long Bay— so good that you can't afford to dress your wife— your wife— in anything but the latest Parisian modes, eh? Didn't know you had a wife, Paul— until the little lady told me."

He held up the coat by the collar-tab and shook it. A long, shimmering line of soft-colored silk slid to the floor. Porter looked at the sergeant, a quizzical smile on his lips.

"There's the goods. Sergeant."

"What the—"

"Couldn't get the trick until I heard a woman in that dancing dump say that petticoats were all the fashion now. Then I kept my eyes open. All the women had petticoats— they showed while they were dancing; didn't flare out like their dresses did. Guessed they were weighted at the hems— and if weighted, why not— you know."

"Petticoats!" the sergeant gasped.

"Petticoats, yes." The Customs man grinned. "Know what a petticoat is? No, perhaps they were before your time. I know, that comes of being a husband— you're not one. If you were, you'd know that women's chatter is always valuable— though some husbands 'ud take persuading to that! Any way—"

"But— petticoats!" Westerham could not grasp the fact.

"Sure! Have nice hems all round; hems that can hold quite a lot if properly packed. The little lady, Miss Treviss, told me that she was introduced to a man in London, who, on hearing that she was coming out to Australia, asked her if she would bring some of the new-fashioned petticoats to a Sydney friend. Said his friend wanted to surprise his wife with a present of the latest Parisian model petticoats, direct from Paris. Paul's that friend, but I ain't yet met his wife."

"But— this petticoat " The sergeant had found the store of drugs.

"That petticoat— and others." The Customs man grinned. "There's quite a number in the young lady's charge, waiting for Scagalli to call, to-morrow, and take them to— to his wife." He frowned suddenly. "There's one thing I'm wild about, though."

"Wild— after a catch like this?" The sergeant gasped.

"Yes, wild." Porter shrugged. "Got sight of the little lady on the boat and wangled to examine her luggage. Let pass quite a lot I could have put the cross on. These petticoats for one thing."

"Whew!" The sergeant whistled. "So it's 'gentlemen prefer blondes,' eh? Now, Mrs. Porter—"

"Oh, finish it if you must. 'But they marry brunettes.' I did! Mrs. P.'s got no cause to shout!"

__________________

16: The Elusive Mr Chon

Aidan De Brune

World's News (Sydney) 4 Nov 1931

WHEN Customs Officer Joe Porter walked into the office at No. 1 Wharf, Circular Quay, Sydney, he received the message that Detective-Sergeant Westerham had been asking for him and had left the message to ring him up immediately he returned.

For some moments Porter hesitated. What did Sergeant Westerham want? He ran over the list of his activities for the past few days. So far as he could remember he had not deliberately stepped on the detective's mental toes.

With a shrug of his shoulders he turned to the telephone and rang up police headquarters. A few minutes' wait and Westerham came to the instrument:

"That Customs Officer Porter? Oh, yes, that you, Joe? Well, I can't talk now. Can you meet me up-town, usual place, in about half an hour? Right! Explain then!"

Hastily clearing up the few details that remained from his day's work, Porter sauntered up-town, to the cafe. He knew he had guessed right immediately he had entered the doors, for in a quiet corner was seated Sergeant Westerham, his satellite, Constable Malcolm, in close attendance.

Westerham, after a brief greeting, waited until the attendant had supplied Porter's requirements, then suddenly planked on the. marble-topped table a cable-flimsy.

"What do you make of that, Joe Porter?" he asked.

Methodically the Customs man read the half-dozen words:—

PLEASE MEET MR. CHON MARATUI SATURDAY.

"Well, what's the trouble?" he asked, perplexedly. "I guess there's a few dozen similar telegrams in Sydney like, this one. People seem, to think that any friend taking a sea voyage becomes automatically helpless, and wastes quite, a lot of good splosh cabling round for him to be met and taken in charge."

"Who's Mr. Chon?"

"I don't know."

"I'd give a week's pay to get a line on Mr. Chon!" spluttered Westerham, explosively.

"He's not Chinese." The Customs man spoke suddenly. "There's not more than a hundred Chinese family names and 'Chon' isn't one, I'll swear."

"Only a hundred family names among five hundred million Chinese?" queried the sergeant, incredibly. "Go on!"

"True!" Porter scanned the flimsy again. "Where did you get this?"

"Raided 'Dingbats'' Floriani yesterday." explained Westerham. "Didn't get a line on anything; someone had probably tipped him off; but Malcolm found that in the side-pocket of a jacket in the wardrobe. 'Dingbats' said that he wore the suit the previous day. Now look at the date." The sergeant's stubby forefinger jabbed at the flimsy. "See? Date the day before we raided him. I asked him who 'Mr. Chon' was, and he only grinned."

This was more serious. The dope merchants of Sydney are not in the habit of meeting incoming liners, unless rising at that unusually early hour is directly to their advantage. Again the Customs man scanned the few words. What meaning lay behind them?

"What do you want me to do?" he asked, at length. "Keep a watch for this Mr. Chon, or...."

Then a new light dawned on his puzzled brain, and he sat back in his chair, staring at the sergeant He wanted to laugh outright— loudly, uproariously.

"So that's it!" A grin gradually widened on his face, until it almost stretched from ear to ear. "Want to be at the wharf to welcome in the Maratui, eh, sergeant? Well, you've the freedom of the wharves. I can't keep you out. Only your guilty conscience can do that, eh? Kick up a shine when I go into the city after a suspect— and think I'll retaliate when you come on the wharf." He drank up his coffee and rose to his feet, still grinning broadly.

"Well, I'll get along," he concluded. "Just to be kind and polite, I'll add: Customs Inspector Joe Porter has the honor of requesting the company of Sergeant Westerham and Constable Malcolm to welcome to dock the Maratui— and 'Mr. Chon.'"

"Well, if you take it like that..." The sergeant spoke in obvious embarrassment.

"I do.". Porter waved a lordly hand. "Thank heavens, I'm not of a jealous disposition. Come and do your bit, Saturday—but that ain't to say I'll spill the beans to you, if I get on to anything."

He turned to the door. He was determined to beat the Drug Squad to Mr. Chon, and bent his wits to the task. Who was Mr. Chon? For what reason had 'Dingbats' Floriani been cabled to meet him at the wharf?

During the intervening days, before the Maratui arrived in Sydney. Joe Porter gave a lot of thought to his problem. He journeyed into Chinatown and questioned several of his Chinese acquaintances regarding Mr. Chon. His inquiries met with no success; he only met confirmation of his theory that 'Chon' was not a Chinese family name.

Incidentally he learned that Westerham was covering the same  ground. Again he grinned, yet he was worried. The Maratui came in the next morning and he had not a single line on 'Mr Chon'.

One of his first acts had been to consult the shipping list of passengers, on the boat. Mr. Chon's name did not figure there; yet that was not to say that he was not on board the boat. Always many names were missing from the list. The man might have booked at the last moment, after the lists had been made up; he might be aboard, under an other name;

Sergeant Westerham and Constable Malcolm were on the wharf long before half-past seven the next morning. To their surprise they could find no signs of Customs-officer Porter. They were worried when eight o'clock drew near, and the inspector did not put in an appearance. The watchman informed them that Porter had been at the wharf very early that morning, soon after six. but he had not seen him for more than an hour.

'"Course, he's stolen a march on us," Constable Malcolm remarked bitterly, as he and Westerham watched the big ship draw into its berth. "Just what he would do. I'll bet anything he's on board now. Went down to quarantine and boarded her there. Yes, look there, sergeant. There he is— and he's got the cheek to be waving to us!"

"Of course!" Westerham echoed. "We give him the dinkum dope and he collars all the kudos!"

There was no mistaking Porter, standing close to the bulwarks, waving to them. Malcolm stared across the harbor, and Westerham deliberately turned his back. Yet, when the gangway was lowered, they could not resist being the first on board.

"Well?" The sergeant's face was flushed, angrily. "Where's this Mr. Chon?"

"'Mister Chon's right!" Porter's grin almost exasperated the police officer beyond endurance. "Come along, Westerham, and I'll give you a special introduction."

He dragged the reluctant sergeant to the crew's quarters. In one of the messrooms they found a ship's officer standing guard over a sailor. Beside the seated man was a large, locked box.

"Very good of you to relieve me, so that I could welcome Sergeant Westerham aboard." Porter was all affability. "Oh, by the way— Sergeant Westerham and Constable Malcolm— Mr. Varney, one of the ship's officers."

"So you say this is Mr. Chon?" Westerham stood before the seated man. He turned suddenly on the Customs. man. "Say, who handcuffed him?"

"Captain's orders, sergeant. I found him and reported the matter to the captain while the ship was in quarantine. He ordered his arrest and detention until you could take him over. By the way, his name's not 'Mr. Chon'; he's Serge Morayitch; says he's a Russian."

"What the—" Westerham stared.

"Course you couldn't guess the solution of your problem. Have to have something of an education to get at these things." Porter did not explain that the ship's doctor had "educated" him on the subject a bare half-hour previous. "It's like this. I went down to meet the ship, in quarantine, because I fancied that if anything passed it would be somewhere there. And I was right, too."

"Think yourself mighty clever—" commenced the sergeant; but Porter interrupted :

"Oh, come on, Westerham! Take your man and let Mr. Varney have his dainty bracelets. He's a busy man when the ship's at the wharf."

Dazedly the police officer removed the ship's handcuffs, substituting a pair from his own pocket. Then he turned his attention to the box. He tried to open it. but it was locked. A rather strained smile on his face, he turned to the Customs man.

"Seems you've scored, Joe. Well, I'll buy! Suppose this is the dope? Now, straight. Where's Mr. Chon?"

"Here." Porter placed his hand on the box. "This box is full of Chon— only your cable flimsy didn't spell his name quite right. It should be—"

He pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, and handed it to the dazed sergeant. Westerham read, half-aloud, yet did not understand:—

C_21H_230_3N.

"Simple, ain't it?" Porter chortled. "Leave out them little figures and you get 'CHON.' They put a 'Mr.' before it to puzzle you, if you got on to the cable; But it didn't puzzle me."

He waited a few minutes, but the bewilderment on Westerham's face did not abate.

"Don't you understand?" The Customs man was impatient. "Why, they teach it in the schools! 'Chon's' the chemical name for heroin!"

___________________

17: Spring is Here

With Poems and Bath Tubs

Will Rogers

(1879-1935)

The World’s One Hundred Best Short Stories Vol 10, 1924

WELL, THERE has been quite a bit happened since I last communed with you. Spring is coming; I can tell by the Poetry and the Real Estate ads. A Poet exists all year just to get his Poem published in the Spring. Then when he sees it in print he starts getting next Spring’s verse all ready. These early Spring Real Estate ads read, “This House is located on the shady banks of a Beautiful stream.” Say, if there is a beautiful stream anywhere now the Rail Road runs along it and all you have to do is to get run over by a freight train to reach this beautiful stream.

A favorite ad is, “Beautiful Home in heart of the most exclusive Residential District, 5 Master Bedrooms and 9 baths; Owner going to Europe.” Now let’s just take that ad out and dissect it and see what it is.

In a Real Estate man’s eye, the most exclusive part of the City is wherever he has a House to sell. The Dog Pound may be on one side and the City Incinerator on the other but it’s still exclusive. And it is, too, for it will be the only house in the world so situated.

Five Master Bedrooms! Now, they get that Master junk from English ads here the man may be the master. Still, I don’t know why they call all the rooms his. Over here they call them Master Bedrooms but the Wife will pick out the Poorest one for him, and keep the other 4 Good ones for Company.

Now, to the ordinary man on reading that Ad of 9 Baths, that would be an insult to his cleanliness. A Man would have to be awful Busy to support that many Baths, unless, of course, he neglected some of them. The ad might better have read, “Buy our home and live in a Bath Tub.” The biggest part of City homes nowadays have more Baths than Beds. So, while they can’t always ask their Company to stay all night as they have no place to put them, they can at least ask them to Bathe. So, when you are invited out now, you can always be assured of your private Bath, but you must leave before Bed-time.

When you visit a friend’s newly finished Home you will be shown through all the Bath rooms, but when you leave you couldn’t, to save your soul, tell where the dining room was. They seem to kinder want to camouflage or hide that nowadays. There is such little eating being done in the Homes now that a dining room is almost a lost art. Breakfast is being served in bed, Dinner at the Cabaret with dancing attached, and lunch—no up-to-date Man would think of going anywhere but to his Clubs for lunch. Besides, didn’t he hear a funny one and must get to the Club to bore his alleged friends with it? He will talk everybody’s left ear off all day and come home and bite his Wife’s off if she asks him to tell her the news.

And then they have such an enlightening custom nowadays. Every body of men who can think of a name have a Club. And is not Congressman Blindbridle, who has just returned from a free Government trip to Bermuda, going to deliver a Message at today’s Luncheon on “Americanism, Or what we owe to the Flag”?

Now, as the dining room space has been eliminated to make room for an additional Bath, most of the eating, if one happens to be entertaining at home, is done off The Lap. This custom of slow starvation has shown vast improvement of late. Instead of the Napkins being of Paper, why, they have been supplanted by almost-linen ones with beautiful hem stitching. That’s to try and get your mind off the lack of nourishment. As I say, the Napkin is hand sewn but the Lettuce Sandwiches still come from the Delicatessen.

Why, in the good old days, they couldn’t have fed you on your lap ’cause you couldn’t have held all they would give you. Now you have to feel for it to find it.

But the Husband does come home some time during the Day or Night, for is not the overhead on his outlay of Baths going on all the time, and shouldn’t he be getting home to get some good out of some of them?

It’s not the high cost of Living that is driving us to the Poor House,—It’s the high Cost of bathing.

The big question today is not what are you going to pay for your plot of ground, but what kind of fixtures are you going to put in your legion of Bath Rooms. Manufacturers of Porcelain and Tile have Supplanted the Pocket Flask as our principal commodity.

The interest on unpaid-for Bath Rooms would pay our National Debt.

Now, mind you, I am not against this modern accomplishment, or extravagance, of ours. I realize that these Manufacturers of Fixtures have advanced their Art to the point where they are practically modern Michael Angelos. Where, in the old days, an Elephant Hook was almost necessary for a Wife to drag her Husband toward anything that looked like Water, today those Interior Bath Decorators can almost make one of those things inviting enough to get in without flinching.

But, in doing so, they have destroyed an American Institution, and ruined the only Calendar that a Child ever had. That was the Saturday Night bath. Nowadays a Child just grows up in ignorance. From the Cradle to the Altar he don’t know what day of the week it is. In those good old days he knew that the next morning after that weekly Ear washing he was going to Sunday School. Now he has not only eliminated the Bath on Saturday but has practically eliminated the Sunday School, for neither he nor his Parents know when Sunday comes.

But, in those days, that old Kitchen Stove was kept hot after supper. And not only the Tea kettle was filled but other Pots and Pans, and the Family Wash Tub was dragged up by the Fire, and you went out to the Well and helped your Pa draw some Water to mix with that hot. While you was doing that, your Ma, if you stayed Lucky and had a Ma up to then, was a getting out all the clean Clothes and a fixing the Buttons, and a laying out the schedule of who was to be first. And She was the only one could tell just how much hot Water to put in to make it right. And if anybody had to feel of the hot water and get burned it was always her, not you, and she found dirt behind, and in, your ears that all the Highfaluting Fixtures in the World can’t find today.

Now that was an event. It meant something. It brought you closer together. But now bathing is so common there’s No Kick To It. It’s just Blah!

The Romans started this Bath Gag; now look what become of them. They used to have the most beautiful Baths, kind of a Municipal Bath, where they all met and strolled around and draped themselves on Marble Slabs. It was a kinder Society event. It compared to our modern Receptions. I have seen some beautiful Paintings of them, but I have yet to see a Scene where a Roman was in the Water. But they did look, oh, just too cunning, sunning themselves out on the Concrete Banks of those Pools. It must have been like visiting our modern Beaches, where no one can swim but the Life Guard, and they don’t know that he can as he has never been called on to go in. But, like the Romans, our Girls can arrange themselves in the most bewitching shapes out on the sand, which, after all, must be much more comfortable than the Asphalt that those little Caesars had to spread themselves over.

I tell you if Baths keep on multiplying in the modern Home as they have lately it won’t be 5 Years till a Bath Tub will be as necessary in a home as a Cocktail Shaker.

If two members of the same household have to use the same Bath, it is referred to now as a Community Tub.

Statistics have proven that there are 25 Bath Tubs sold to every Bible.

And fifty to every Dictionary, and 380 to every Encyclopedia.

Proving that, while we may be neglecting the Interior, we are looking after the exterior.

If the Father of our Country, George Washington, was Tutankhamened tomorrow, and, after being aroused from his Tomb, was told that the American People today spend two Billion Dollars yearly on Bathing Material, he would say, “What got ’em so dirty?”

_____________________

18: Monsieur De Guise

Perley Poore Sheehan

1875-1943

The Scrap Book Jan 1911

THAT any one should live in the center of Cedar Swamp was in itself so singular as to set all sorts of queer ideas to running through my head. A more sinister morass I had never seen. It was as beautiful and deadly as one of its own red moccasins, as treacherous and fascinating.

It was a tangle of cypress and cedar almost thirty miles square, most of it under water— a maze of jungle-covered islands and black bayous. There were alligators and panthers, bear and wild pig. There were groans and grunts and queer cries at night, and silence, dead silence by day.

That was Cedar Swamp as I knew it after a week of solitary hunting there. I no longer missed the sun. My eyes had become used to the perpetual twilight. My nerves no longer bothered me when I stepped into opaque water, or watched a section of gliding snake. But the silence was getting to be more than I could bear. It was too uncanny.

And now, just after I had noticed it, and wondered at it for the hundredth time, I heard a voice. It was low and clear— that of a woman who sings alto. There were four or five notes like the fragment of a strange song. And then, before I had recovered from the shock of it, there was silence again.

I was up to my knees in water at the time, wading a narrow branch between two islands. I must have stood there for a full minute waiting for the voice to resume, but the silence closed in on me deeper than ever. With a little shiver creeping over one part of my body after another, I stole ashore.

The island was one of the highest I had yet encountered. I had not taken a dozen steps up through the dank growth of its shelving shore before I found a deeply worn path. This, I could see, ran down to the water-front in one direction, where I caught a glimpse of a boathouse masked by trees. I turned and followed the path in the other direction up a gentle slope.

As I advanced, the jungle around me thinned out and became almost park-like. There were open stretches of meadow and clumps of trees, suggesting the landscape garden. But I was so intent on discovering the owner of the voice that the wonder of this did not at first impress me. I had, moreover, an eerie, uneasy sensation of being watched.

I walked slowly. I carried my gun with affected carelessness. I looked around me as though I were a mere tourist dropped in to see the sights.

I HAD thus covered, perhaps, a quarter of a mile, when the path turned into an avenue of cabbage-palmetto, at the further end of which I saw a house. It was large and white, with a pillared porch, such as they used to build before the war. It was shaded by a magnificent grove of live-oak trees. There were beds of geranium and roses in front, and clusters of crepe-myrtle and flowering oleander on a well-clipped lawn.

It all gave an impression of infinite care, of painstaking upkeep, of neatness and wealth, yet, there was not a soul in sight. Not a servant was there. No dog barked. I saw no horses, no chickens, no pigeons, nor sheep; nor familiar animate emblem whatever of the prosperous farm.

I stood in the presence of this silent and lonely magnificence with a feeling that was not exactly fear, but rather stupefaction. For a moment I was persuaded that I had emerged from the great swamp into some unknown plantation of its littoral. But a moment was enough to convince me that this could not be. I was, without the slightest doubt, almost at the exact center of the morass. I was too familiar with its circumference and general contour to be wrong as to that. For a dozen miles at least, in every direction, Cedar Swamp surrounded this island of mystery with its own mysterious forests and bayous.

Once again I was acutely aware of being stared at. Almost at the same instant a man's voice addressed me from behind my back.

"Monsieur," it asked, "why do you hesitate?"

I might as well confess it right away— I believe in ghosts. I have seen too many things in my life that were not to be explained by the commonly accepted laws of nature. I have lived too much among the half-civilized and learned too much of their odd wisdom to recognize any hard and fast definition of what is real and what is not.

From the moment I heard that bit of song in the swamp, I felt that I was passing from the commonplace into the weird. My succeeding impressions had confirmed this feeling. And now, when I heard the voice behind me: "Monsieur, why do you hesitate?"— I was not sure that it was the voice of a human being at all.

I turned slowly, my mind telling me that I should see no one.

It was with a distinct feeling of relief, therefore, that I saw a small, pale, well-dressed old man smiling at me as though he had read my secret thoughts. His face was cleanly shaven and bloodless. His head, partly covered by a black velvet skull-cap, was extremely large. His snow-white hair was silky and long. His eyes, which were deeply sunken, were large and dark. His appearance, as well as the question which he had just put to me, suggested the foreigner. He was not alone un-American; he appeared to be of another century, as well.

I said something about intruding. He made a brusque gesture, almost of impatience, and, telling me to follow him, started for the house.

It was as though I was an expected guest. Only the absence of servants maintained that feeling of the bizarre, which never left me. The interior of the house was in keeping with its outward appearance — sumptuous and immaculate. My host led me to the door of a vast chamber on the first floor, motioned me to enter, and standing at the door, said:

"Monsieur, luncheon will be served when you reappear. Pray, make yourself at home."

Then he left me.

Two details of this room impressed me: the superlative richness of the toilet articles, all of which were engraved with a coat-of-arms, and the portrait of a woman, by Largilliere. All women were beautiful to Largilliere, but in the present instance he had surpassed himself. The gentle, aristocratic face, with its tender, lustrous eyes, was the most alluring thing I had ever seen. At the bottom of the massive frame was the inscription: "Anne-Marie, Duchesse de Guise. Anno 1733."

I was still marveling at the miracle which had brought such an apparition to the heart of an American swamp when I heard a light step in the hallway, and I knew that my host was awaiting me.

The luncheon, which was served cold in a splendid dining-room, had been laid for two. I wondered at this, for still no servant appeared, and surely I could not have been expected. And my host added to my mystification rather than lessened it when he said: "Monsieur, I offer you the place which is usually reserved for my wife."

Apart from this simple statement, the meal was completed in silence. Now and then I thought I surprised him, nodding gravely, as though someone else were present. I suspected him several times of speaking in an undertone. But, my mind was so preoccupied with the inexplicable happenings of the preceding hour that I was not in a condition to attack fresh mysteries now.

He scarcely touched his food. Indeed, his presence there seemed to be more in the nature of an act of courtesy than for the purpose of taking nourishment. As soon as I had finished he at once arose and invited me to follow him.

ACROSS the hall was a music-room, with high French windows, opening on the porch. He paused at one of these windows now and plucked the flower from a potted heliotrope. The perfume of it seemed to stimulate him strangely. He at once became more animated. A slight trace of color mounted to his waxen cheeks. Turning to me, abruptly, he remarked:

"I mentioned just now my wife. Perhaps you noticed her portrait?"

As he spoke, a faint breath of the heliotrope came to me, and with it, by one of those odd associations of ideas, the portrait by Largilliere. I saw again the gentle face and the lustrous eyes, but the date— 1733. Surely, this was not the portrait he referred to.

But he had seen the perplexity in my face, and he broke out in French: "Oui, oui; c'est moi, monsieur de Guise." And then, in English. "It was the portrait of my wife you saw, madame la duchesse par monsieur Largilliere."

"But then, madame, your wife," I stammered, "is dead."

He was still smelling the heliotrope. He looked up at me with his somber eyes for a moment as though he had failed to grasp my meaning. Then he said:

"No, no. There is no such thing as death — only life. For, what is life? — the smile, the perfume, the voice. Ah, the voice! Will you hear her sing?"

FOR a brief instant my head turned giddily. The world I had always known, the world of tragedies, of sorrows, of physical joys and pains, the world of life and death, in short, was whirling away from beneath my feet. And I began to recall certain old stories I had heard about the visible servants of the invisible, the earthly agents of the unearthly. Such things have been known to exist.

Monsieur de Guise was walking up and down the room murmuring to himself in French. I could catch an occasional word of endearment. Once I saw him distinctly press the heliotrope to his lips. He had forgotten my presence, apparently. He was in the company of some one whom he alone could see. And then he seated himself at the piano.

I had a presentiment of what was coming. I dropped into a chair and closed my eyes. Again the heliotrope perfumed the air around me. I saw the smooth brow, the sympathetic eyes, the magic smile of the Duchesse de Guise, and then a voice — that voice I had heard in the swamp — began to sing, so soft, so sweet, that a little spasm twitched at my throat and a chill crept down my back. It was a love-song, such as they sang centuries ago. I know little French, but- it told of love in life and death — "Mot, je Vai y vive et morte, incessament aimee."

And when I opened my eyes again, all that I saw was the shrivelled black figure of Monsieur de Guise, his silvered head thrown back with the air of one who has seen a vision.

Subconsciously I had heard something else while listening to the song. It was the swift, muffled throb of an approaching motorboat. Monsieur de Guise had heard it, too, for now he left the piano and approached the window. Presently I could see a dozen negroes approaching along the avenue of palms. They seemed strangely silent for their race.

"These are my people," said my host. "Once a week I send them to the village. They will carry you away."

The afternoon was far advanced when I bade Monsieur de Guise farewell. As I looked back for the last time the sunset was rapidly dissolving the great white house and its gardens in a golden haze. His figure on the porch was all that linked it to the world of man.

Late that night I was landed at a corner of Cedar Swamp, adjacent to my home. My black boatman, who had spoken never a word, immediately backed his barge away into the darkness, leaving me there alone. And, although I have since made several efforts to repeat my visit to Monsieur de Guise, I have never been successful. Once, indeed, I found again what I believed to be his island, but it was covered entirely with a dense, forbidding jungle. Which will doubtless discredit this story, as it has caused even me to reflect.

But grant that the story is true, and that Monsieur de Guise was merely mad. Why, then, in a certain event, which I need not mention, may God send me madness, too!

_____________________

19: Demons of the Cold

Raymond S. Spears

1876–1950

All-Story, September, 1913

TWICE in one day at L’Amadieu station Jem Josen and Couray Follensby disagreed— just the merest little tiffs about whether they should carry five or seven dozen jump-traps and the other on the number of cartridges they should take in for the little bait-rifle.

If they had been going to pass the winter at the station, or even if they had been going to remain a few days longer there, the disagreements would have been forgotten; but they were packing for the long canoe-journey through lakes and rivers to trapping- grounds where they would be alone all winter long. Not only did they need all their fortitude, but they needed perfect, serene, confident peace.

Trappers of marten and lynx, fishers and mink, otter and weasel, poisoners of foxes and wolves, they had traveled together for years; and they knew as all men in the wilds know, that to start upon the weary winter months with even so small a dispute between them as a matter of two dozen traps and two hundred .22 caliber cartridges meant that they would find the tail of the winter full of bitterness.

But they could not wait long enough, to forget. Not ten hours after they had trifled irritably with each other’s nerves they dipped their paddles deep and cut the still water with their canoe bow. T
heir canoe was deep-laden with thirteen hundred pounds of supplies, and the whole station, unmindful of their worry, turned out to see them depart—an event, even where the departure of trappers into the fastnesses of the fir country is not infrequent during the autumn.

Big Couray sat in the stern, swinging his strange New Zealand Maori blade— a shallow spoon— while Black Jem knelt in the bow, driving deep a conventional Canadian paddle. It was almost an experience to see this couple depart, backing out into the placid lake and then driving round into the true course toward the north country.

Their poise, their precision, their practiced grace, delighted the eyes of men and women who recognized the perfection of woodsmanship.

There was little need of speaking about the making of lunch and the night camping. Each knew what to do, and did it without parley and in unison— Big Couray got up the night-wood, Black Jem shook out the rabbit fur sleeping-bags, laid down the bunk boughs, and together they pitched the little tent, got the meal, and ate. After that they sat smoking while the evening shadows chased the reflections across the stone-studded lake.

Through the north country, as on the arid deserts of the Mojave, men know that the least tinge of disagreement grows into bitterness and hate. The bitter cold, like the scorching heat, tries the tempers of men; and these two trappers, full of northland lore, found themselves musing over the tales of hate they had heard— and of the tragic ends.

They mixed their bannock bread and baked it on the flat stone, and had only one laugh— when Big Couray, at the head of the river, selected a thin slab of blow-up stone, and the thing exploded with a crash that threw the fire in all directions, and the dough turned somersaults in the air, shot to pieces with broken stone.

The laugh— the fact that they could laugh— eased the strain of dread and apprehension. The two became more cheerful, and they talked as of old, with only the least of restraint. They arrived at the new trapping-lands they had discovered the previous year, and put up their log main camp, roofed with spruce-boughs and clay, and with mica windows.

When their home camp was built they took on their winter work— trapping. One stepped out in the late afternoon and shot a good cow moose; and the other, with the little bait-rifle, had been amusing himself hanging up porcupines for bait, for the porcupine is better for fisher, wolverine, marten, and mink than any other bait.

With skilled impatience they ran their line down the river, building a cubby for each trap and setting a well-sweep pole so that when any victim was caught its struggles would swing it clear of the snow, too high for hungry wolf to seize.

They worked the harder because they felt the faint restraint that was upon them; they wanted to be tired—dead tired—so that they would not have energy to waste in frivolous bickering. Nevertheless, there was ominous upcropping of temper from time to time.

They disagreed as to whether they should put a trap on a log or against a rock ledge not ten yards distant.

Black Jem was snappish, and Big Couray did not dispute; Black Jem built a cubby on the log, and Big Couray put one under the ledge— a waste of a trap, it seemed.

They wolfed through the timber, reading the trails and the signs and the lay of the land. They snarled when one found a set or an otter-slide or a marten-crossing first— low and ominous snarl, held back, held in check, because ahead of them was the long and bitter winter through which they must make their way together, whatever might be in their hearts.

They ran their line forty miles down the river, and forty miles up what they called Otter Fork— because they shot an otter on it the first thing—then through a chain of lakes, and finally along the edge of a great, undulating barren, with pockets of woodland and heavy brush in ravines.

Thence they struck southward again and came out within half a mile of their camp— more than two hundred miles of trap-line to follow from day to day, week to week, through the long winter of short days, long twilights, and unspeakable nights.

After a day in the main camp, where they took time to hang up meat for the winter, they drew cuts to see who should travel around the east line and who should go the west.

Big Couray won. He hesitated a moment before making his choice, and then he picked the east line. Black Jem sniffed and held back a snarl with difficulty. Why had Big Couray taken the course that would make him face the northwest and north winds through the lakes and barren country? It was almost an insult, if it wasn’t an insult to the strength and endurance of Black Jem for Couray to take the hard way, when he had won the right to the easy way. Black Jem spoke up quickly:

“We’ll take turn and turn— east and west!”

“All right, Jem— as you say!” the big fair-haired man assented. “Jes’ as you say, Jem!”

With no good-byes— with no “good luck” on their lips— they strode away, each on his lonely tour to meet at one of the side camps a hundred miles away, on the far side of their circle.

When they met they were in a better mood. Being alone had softened their asperity and smoothed the edge of their watchful temper. No snow had fallen, but they had their snow-shoes lest they be trapped on their way. They greeted almost cordially, and they smoked side by side in the little camp, telling of the luck on the line.

It had been a great trip. They had a score of mink, five fishers, seven martens, three lynx, and Black Jem had hung up a black bear not five miles from the main camp, cut up ready to take in when Big Couray should go that way.

Black Jem’s evil genius, which had lurked with him when he was alone, now seemed vanquished. He was the merry Black Jem of the North, who could sing and dance and carry a huge pack and shoot game in spite of the racket he made in the wilds. All was well till he came to his trap on a log where Big Couray had set a trap under the ledge.

There was nothing in either, but Black Jem paused before the trap he had placed and a shade of anger crossed his face. The trap had been reset— it had been set farther in the cubby and the fence stick moved closer to the jaw! Black Jem sniffed in the little house of death, and then drew back— angry.

“I told him this was the place! So it was! There was marten caught here— and he— he did not say it! Bah! What a man not to say he was wrong. Up comes his trap. It’s no good!”

He took up the other trap and dropped it into his pack for resetting. He marched with lighter step, if anything, proud to be right.

He found a mink, a fisher, a lynx, and again he shot a bear, which he hung up. Fortune was with him.

He reset the trap where a marten track showed in a whiff of snow.

So the partners came to the main camp again, and the profits rolling up well-nigh smothered the resentment that Black Jem felt because Big Couray had not told of his own mistake back there in Two-trap Gap. But Jem said nothing— which was unfortunate.

The deep snow came and the men had to strap on their web shoes. The great toil of the line was now at hand. They had built their line-camps as far apart as they could make them, comfortably, in fair weather, and now, when the snow was 1oose and the webbing sank in almost a foot, the day’s work was long, and it was up before day and into camp after dark most of the time on the trips round.

Two trips passed and Big Couray had made no comment on the taking up of the ledge trap in Two-trap Gap. He seemed not to have noticed it— but Black Jem knew that he had.

His big partner was just soothing his temper, was just letting him have his way, was treating him like a little baby who must be humored. Black Jem could better have stood a cursing than this calm tolerance.

There came a barren trip when they reached the half-way house, and neither had any fur to report, no stories of good luck, and nothing to talk about but the dead lift through loose snow and the terrible pull from camp to camp.

“Nothing!” Big Couray told his partner. “Jes’ one leetle marten pulled out the trap in the— in the Two-trap Gap.”

“He pulled out, you say? I set that trap over again. He could not pull out!”

“Well, he did, just the same—a leetle feller— not wort’ much!”

“But he couldn’t pull out!”

“Well, he did— three times now I find a marten has pulled out that trap!”

“By gar—it can’t be! I reset that trap after you monkey with it each time—and tell me nothing is there!”

“Well, I set it, too. You make the twig too far back from the pan. The marten stepped over it and on the edge of the trap-pan— up go the jaw and pinch his toes!”

“You lie!” Black Jem screamed. “You got one marten this trip—where—where?”

The color left the big man’s cheeks in places, but he made no move.

“I say the truth, Jem!” he choked out with difficulty. “Three times I found that trap sprung, and just toenails—”

“You took a marten out the first time—you know it!”

“I found it sprung— I set it right— perhaps— perhaps the wind blew the twig-fence— but— but— Jem, I told you what is true!”

The big man had turned and faced his partner, and Black Jem saw his fingers twitching and his jaws clanking. Black Jem knew that he would be torn into small pieces then and there—he had seen those hands tear the paunch out of a wildcat that had struck the man. The little man subsided, and not another word was spoken that night, nor for the weeks that followed.

The common bonds of food, shelter, business, cold, and loneliness held them together, and held them to the task that they had undertaken. They marched round the lines, met at the far camp, passed on after the night of gloom, and re-met at the main camp.

They were unswerving in their regularity. They rested three days at the main camp, cared for the furs, cooked their meals, kept the fires, and even hunted down in moose yard, where they put down big bait and some good meat besides.

It was wolf and fox time— especially the latter. They were plenty, and to put out poison for them meant rich fur, and perhaps a silver or black fox that would mean a thousand dollars some day. Perhaps a black fox was what they needed to break their antagonism—but there was nothing they could think of doing.

Black Jem, cowed by the bitter and just anger of his partner saw many things is he sat alone in one of the little side-line camps. He felt humiliated and degraded— for once he saw that he was not the equal of the big man.

Always the little man had lifted his end of the pole, tramped his miles of line, kept his end of the canoe straight— he had felt the equal of any man and the superior of most. Now he cowered beneath the calm and lofty supremacy of mere huge physique— and then came the temptation to use his brains.

He could kill with a bullet, or even poison with fox-pills— but he shrank from those things as murder. No, he could not kill Big Couray that way. He wondered if there was not some accident that could happen?

Out of the silence came the running howl of a hungry wolf pack, and when the first moment of doubt had gone by Black Jem’s thoughts thumped with the fact of the wolf hunger.

Alone in the little side-line camp, he glanced swiftly behind him, lest there be something there to read his thoughts. Then he went to his pack-basket and drew out the little vial of medicine— the scent that afflicts the famished wolf with reckless hope.

Black Jem shook the bottle toward the fire and grinned leanly at the color, and he even loosened the cork to catch a whiff of the not unpleasant odor of anise and musk and other things.

He was on his way early in the morning; all day he lunged ahead, and that night he sharpened, his knife to an even sharper edge. The next night he came into the meeting-camp and found it cold. This did not signify anything, and it gave Jem opportunity to plan what he had in mind to do.

The wolves were plenty, their tracks came down to the trap line in scores, and they might have been taken in numbers had it been worth while to bait and poison them. Their hides, however, were heavy; it would be better to let them work down to the canoe waters, and thus save lugging them.

After dark Big Couray came in, dead tired and hardly able to set one foot before the other. It had been a bitter half-line trip for him— Jem saw that. His face was frosted on one side from bucking the wind through the barrens, and he had carried in two lynx— because he had found them too cold to skin— and their weight on his shoulders had borne him down, strong and big as he was.

All this was as Jem would have had it. Weary men are not attentive, but there was more to come.

From a distance came the howling chorus of a great wolf pack, racing with hunger across the snow. There were so many of them that even Jem slipped the cross-bar more firmly in its hooks behind the door, and Couray felt in his pouch to make certain that he had a pocketful of shells ready in case the pack should assail the cabin.

Closer came the pack, and the wilds were filled with its rolling chorus. The echoes reverberated from the frozen hills and trembled in the brittle timber. They came nearer, and the men could not distinguish the echoes, they were so close, yelping on a trail.

“Good thing I got in when I did!” Big Couray exclaimed, speaking for the first time in weeks. “They followed me in.”

At that the face of Black Jem suddenly grew dark with evil inspiration, and he listened more intently while the wolves swept through the timber.

Howling with baffled rage, the pack charged past, splitting to pass by the lighted and smoking cabin. The trappers heard them gnashing their teeth as they snapped by.

“They’re bad!” the big trapper continued.

“They’re meaner an’ hongrier ‘n ever!” Black Jem snarled assent, thinking of his opportunity, for his mad hate had found a way to overcome the superiority of the big man who had cowed him with a look, a growl, and a twitch of his fingers.

Big Couray was up long before dawn, and he spoke again as if the common peril of wolves and storm was more than their own differences— but Black Jem scorned the big man’s good nature and endeavor to bring peace between them. He hid the exultant anger in his heart by silence, turning his head to catch the distant roll of a wolf slinking from the dawn.

“Let’s hit back together!” the big man cried eagerly, as if some omen of impending terror had affected him.

Jem, not without some superstitious dread, shuddered under his furs, for he believed the big man had some prevision of the death— but the shudder went out in angry spite.

“What,” he demanded, “ and leave half the line uncovered?”

Big Couray flinched under the scorn— the implied epithet of cowardice— and said no more.

Black Jem lashed on his snow-shoes and strode away on the back track of his partner, rejoicing in the wide swath the wolf-pack had made in the snow.

He strode on, his heart thumping and his face dark with the evil smile that parted his lips in thin. blue lines. If Big Couray was a stronger and better man, he was in the long run no match for Black Jem— or for wolves!

There was no avarice in Black Jem’s heart— no thought of the great catch of furs that would be his if Big Couray disappeared on the long trap-line. His mind was set to revenge.

A wolverine had lugged away the third trap out and Black Jem took up the rascal’s trail, and three miles out of his way had the luck to shoot it.

Skinning it, he returned and reset the trap—six miles behind his schedule.

In the twelfth trap was a lynx, and this put him half an hour more behind—more than three hours, and with twelve miles yet to go he began to lope along, hurrying.

He found a marten, which he impatiently threw into his pack.

Then he found a fisher swinging alive on a well-sweep— a monstrously ugly and tough animal, hard to kill with his hatchet handle. This fisher dead and skinned, he glanced back on his shadowy trail with apprehension.

He was thinking of Big Couray tramping through the wilderness. He himself was late on his trail and he must hurry.

It was colder. There was not much wind and the sky was clear.

It would be a terrible night in the Dark North.

He loped on, springing and stepping far, falling into the snow-shoe run, which a hardened man can keep up for hours.

For the first time he was glad to find some traps empty, but this was another banner trip apparently, for he found martens and another fisher. He paused to snatch off the skins of the animals that were alive and tossed the two frozen martens into his pack.

He was on the run when a sound stopped him short.

It was more than an hour to sunset— and yet he heard the hunting cry of a wolf. If the famished wolf is a horrid creature in the night, still more fearsome, more terrible, is its cry in the day. When the wolf hunts by day its caution, its fears, its cowardice, are all gone— lost in the bitter pangs of famine.

Unable to sleep, driven from its rest, a wolf was hunting, and Black Jem glanced back his own trail and caught his breath. The best he could do, he would be out two hours after nightfall— the wolves were abroad already!

Then he thought of Big Couray— and laughed! The wolves were on Couray’s trail, too!

But it was no time to exult. Black Jem turned and began to run again, and when he next heard the wolf it was nearer and somewhere behind. For one wolf he did not care— he could take care of one— five— a dozen.

But in his ears was the roar of the pack of the night before, and he could almost hear again the gnashing of their teeth as they passed by the camp, baffled by the fire and the smoke.

The sun dropped behind the timber, out of sight, and the long twilight set in. The traps were all empty, and Black Jem flew by them with only a glance. He was gaining—never had he traveled like that before. He would make camp long before he had dreamed he could make it.

Along the edge of the barren the snow was packed and his snowshoes did not sink in. It was there that Big Couray had faced that wind— and the fight had worn him down. In the half-obliterated snowshoe trail were fresh wolf-tracks. Black Jem exulted, thinking of the wolves eager in Big Couray’s trail.

He ran up a long slope, pitched over the edge down a steep sag in the timber, and one snow-shoe toe bridged the side of a fallen tree-trunk just as in the tail of his eye he glimpsed a gray form in the gathering gloom.

He felt the rush of a wolf not yet nerved to attack. Howl answered howl in all directions.

Black Jem drove down his foot for a farther leap— then his moccasin went through the webbing of his snowshoe and, twisting, he plunged headlong in the snow.

With a thrill of terrible surprise, Black Jem as he fell realized that when he had slashed the webbing of snow-shoes with his keen knife it was his own and not Big Couray’s, that he had cut, and now he saw that he had poured wolf-bait medicine on his own snow-shoes and not on his partner’s.

He screamed, for he saw the wolves that had been trailing him through the timber came swinging toward him with savage exaltation.

Struggling to one knee, he fired, and the shot drove them back for a moment.

He unlashed his crippled shoe and then with frantic haste, strung snare-wire though the webbing across the knifed gap— cursing his mistake. He could not work for long.

Wolf answered wolf, and there were black wolves among the gray milling round him, edging in.

“It’ll have to do,” he gasped, and, swinging his pack into the limbs of a tree, he started on again, rifle in hand. There was still daylight, and the wolves hesitated to charge in— but they might charge at any moment now. In the night they would certainly come.

The arctic breeze died out of the woods and the gray breath of the wolves circling round him was plain in the open timber. They circled him, barking and growling, and he could hear their teeth snapping.

From the distance other wolves were coming— from the north and from the south came running cries, exultant and eager, but still cautious, biding their time. They knew they had the man on the run, and they could wait.

It was Black Jem’s crowded hour. He could see the flash of fading eyes turning away from him in the mist. Then he heard a snap behind him, and, turning, was just in time to drive a bullet home in an old dog wolf that was creeping close, too famished not to be willing to set upon a man.

The wolf turned back with a wild yelp, and its mates set upon his wounded sides, mad with blood hunger.

With that taste of blood, a new note came into the chorus which was taken up with hoarser yells the moment the wounded wolf was torn to pieces and gulped down— now they charged.

Black Jem understood he must tree, unless he preferred a quick death to the long, slow agony after belting himself in a tree, with the cold creeping over him and the wolves waiting round for him to fall out, like a ripe Ontario apple!

He climbed, and hardly was the tail of his snow-shoe drawn up when the first wolf came charging under, throwing himself clear of the ground with a snap in the air.

Black Jem took off his snow-shoes then and hung them on a branch. He loosened his belt and passed it round the tree, which was not large. Then, as the wolves gathered round, he shot one and had the satisfaction of seeing the whole pack chase it out of sight, and hearing its squalls.

If a score of wolves ran away two score returned, and Black Jem shot another— shot it through the flanks, just to hear the beast scream and hear its mates tear it to pieces.

He fired and fired again till his rifle was empty, and then he reached for his cartridges. His head chugged painfully as he remembered that the cartridges were all in his pack. He had forgotten to fill his pocket. He could shoot no more. He must wait there while the gaunt wraiths of the night sat round, snapping at one another for choice places under the tree.

He buried his nose in his jacket when he found it hard and he plunged his fingers into his bosom when they stiffened, and the rifle, now useless, dropped from his grasp. The wolves leaped to seize it, and three that seized the barrel were frozen to it by their tongues and lips. At that the others, seeing their helplessness, ate them with growling and eager gusto. It was a sound to quicken the blood of Black Jem, but not for long.

He drew up his feet, he curled down his head, and wrapped his hands. He fought sleep in a night-long battle— a battle that must have seemed hopeless to the wolves, for they curled down on the packed snow under the tree to wait till the man should fall.

There was no wind that day— just the still cold. The sun shone and it was bright against the black lump in the low tree beside the trap-line.

IT WAS a terrible sight to Big Couray when he came pounding along on the trail of his little partner.

Big Couray had started out as his partner had done, but when half-way on to the next line-camp his forebodings, his anxiety, and the mesh-work of wolf-tracks had turned him back, and after another night in the half-way camp he started out to overtake his partner, for company’s sake and to speak at last about the things they never should have kept silent about.

Jem’s pack hanging in the tree frightened Big Couray, but the white-frosted lump in the tree was a thousandfold worse. With an impatient half-dozen shots Big Couray cut down the waiting wolves and sent the others scurrying away.

He tore his partner down from the tree, built a huge fire, and with snow rubbed the white flesh back to life. Then he drove the little man on to the next camp, whipping him into sensibility.

In a few days they could travel on again.

Big Couray went ahead to break the trail, and Black Jem had no pang of jealousy.

The bitterness in his own heart had been frozen out, and Big Couray, who never had understood the matter, said nothing and thought nothing more.

___________________

20: The Queer Place

Frederick Niven

1878-1944

The Popular Magazine, Jul 23 1915

THE celebrated speech of Hamlet to Horatio, beginning "There are more things in heaven and earth," came into the mind of Bill Davies, of Ridge, Montana, when he got to the end of the sequence of events that circled round the Queer Place, on the road to Spring Lake.

From Ridge to Midway is easy going, as a rule, and at Midway the freighters camp. There are not always freighters there, of course; but since the Spring Lake mines opened up, to work steadily day and night, the chances are in favor of seeing, dotting the little pocket valley at Midway, the twinkling camp fires of the freighters outspanned for the night there. Sometimes the only light in the valley is the dropped yellow star of Buck Flannigan's "hotel"— the only one between Ridge and Spring Lake.

Buck built it when the placer miners were tearing out the gravel at Midway, thirty years ago. He stayed on after the creek bed had been torn out, the pocket desecrated, and the banks on either hand were left looking as if a mad giant with a rake had been at work there. Unshaven and bleary, he pottered about his paintless hotel, while year by year nature tried to cover over the signs of havoc, and the shacks of what was once Midway fell log by log. You could never say he had a jag on. He was just soaked, yet always coherent.

Flannigan's was thirty miles from Ridge, and two and thirty from Spring Lake, and it looked very lonely, and Flannigan was the split double of a dime-novel cover of Bad Man Plummer— and there, mark you, were the holes in the floor that told of dancing tenderfeet, and there was Flannigan, smiling, as the chink put down your plate of steak and onions, and Flannigan's voice huskily inquired : "What do you drink with it?"

Most of the freighters did not go near Flannigan's after they hauled into the meadow; just got the horses out, the nose bags on, the frying pan on the fire, the blankets spread. They might, in the morning, "have one" at Flannigan's, but that was about the extent of their visits; for Flannigan's depressed everybody. It wasn't a hotel ; it was a relict. That checkerboard on the table in the corner of the barroom was the most tragic of checkerboards. The most stolid of men would turn, with a shudder, from the checkerboard. And yet it was the only amusement in sixty-two miles.

It used to haunt and fascinate Bill Davies on the infrequent occasions that loneliness, or drizzle, prompted him to go over to Flannigan's after having made camp. Perched on the high seat of his wagon, waggling through the mountains, the impression of 'the lone barroom with the lone checkerboard on the corner table used to stay with him even more poignantly than the impression of Flannigan. When Flannigan was talking to him— when Flannigan's bulging, washed-out eyes made him look away, as one looks away from a cuttlefish— Bill used to look at that checker-board ; then back to Flannigan he would turn, to find Flannigan's eyes queerer still.

Something queer about that checker-board. They didn't play checkers in the old days, when Flannigan's was open day and night. The cards slipped on the table then, the balls ran on the little horses, the dice rattled. In those days, if you wanted to shake for a drink with a friend at Flannigan's you could, by waggling your hand in air for a sign as you advanced to the bar, have the dicebox clapped down there for you. It used to stand on a shelf behind the bar, a dicebox big as a large pepper pot, with dice half an inch square. But it was hidden away when the gold seekers departed, and nature encroached again on Midway— and there was only the checkerboard.

"Queer!"

So thought Davies, haunted by the checkerboard as he waggled through the soundless, red-black woods on his high wagon perch. It was morning, dewy and fragrant in the mountains. Behind him, and below, lay the meadow — Midway Meadow — with its black marks of old fires, its torn river bed, its moldering shacks, and Flannigan's. The horses' hoofs fell muffled, the wheels rolled silently in the foot of dust that was the road. The only noise of his progress was the squeak of cargo rubbing, box against box, and an occasional clink of chains when the whiffle swung.

"Queer about that checkerboard!" It suddenly struck him that there was, perhaps, a game a man could play by himself on a checkerboard.

"Oh, maybe Flannigan plays with the chink!" he considered, and smiled to himself.

No! Flannigan sat all day playing a solitary card game, staring at the cards, setting them out, rearranging them, now this way, now that way, while, outside, the trees stood bolt upright round the little bit of pocket of grass, and the shacks fell into decay, and nothing happened but morning, noon, night, and the crawling hours between — nothing sounded but the creek, the crackle of grasshoppers, the occasional howl of coyote, or scream of bald-headed eagle.

Davies dismissed the sense of queerness and depression, about the place where he usually did dismiss it— dismissed Flannigan's codfish eyes, the furtive, half-frightened-looking chink, and the memory of that barren interior with the checkerboard on the corner table. He dismissed Flannigan's on arrival at a spot where the horses always shied, or tried to bolt, or tried to wheel aside. The same thing always happened at this bend of the road, and he supposed that some former driver had beaten the animals here — overbeaten them, too. Somehow or other, it did not strike him to wonder if both horses had been beaten there, if they had been partners for years. He didn't delve as deep as that. But he knew that about two miles above Flannigan's, going toward Spring Lake, he never failed to have trouble with them.

To-day, just after he passed that place, and got them sensible again, he saw ahead, coming toward him, two riders. They couldn't have come from Spring Lake, unless they had started after supper last night. It was still early in the day, and Bill had been up with the sunrise. Then he recognized them. One was Captain Moyes, of the Moyes Mines; the other, he believed, was a back-East engineer connected with some syndicate— a man with a double-barreled name, he had heard. Thompson-Smith, he thought it was. Anyhow, this man Thompson-Smith— or Johnson-Smith, he wasn't sure which— was in the country looking at various prospects that the success of the Spring Lake vein was bringing before the gaze of the speculators again. So the boys said, at any rate. Davies gave them "How-do!" in passing, and, interested in horseflesh, as well as in the long, lean Easterner who looked as if he should have been a Westerner, he looked round after them.

"Can ride, all right!" he thought, as he observed a sudden trembling and side dancing and general cavorting of the young engineer's horse at the bend of the road. It seemed to upset Moyes' pony, but Bill knew that Moyes was a horseman, and merely watched the Easterner. He laughed as he saw that long, lean man dwindle down the road, "staying with it" excellently. Down the aisle in the wood— for thus the slit of wagon road seemed— a pennon of dust wavered after the riders had vanished round the bend.

A joggling of his wagon caused Bill to look ahead once more, and caution his horses with: "Steady, now; don't you know the road by this time?" But it was not fright with them again. Perhaps in turning round to see how the engineer fellow rode he had pulled a rein by accident.

"Steady, you! Steady!"

And they plodded on demurely in the steady and blameless plod into which they always settled soon after having passed that bend.

ii

ABOUT NOON, Bill halted at Saskatoon Creek, hauling aside from the road, as was the usage with most who came there, whether others were expected or not. Some would not haul aside until they heard the squeak of harness, or joggle of load, that announced another team on trek ; but Bill was not of those. He got out bits there, and nose bags on, ran a careful eye and a massaging hand over his big beasts, rinsed his hands in the creek, and sat down to enjoy his own lunch during the half-hour rest.

He had just got through the rinsing when from the direction of his travel came the intermittent squeaks that announce an advancing wagon. And here it was, waggling through the woods on the deep-rutted road, Jim Conyers drowsy on high, wrist on knee, lines in hand, humming some plaintive and catchy song. They waved forefinger and second finger of a hand to each other, grinned up, grinned down; and then Conyers reined in, throwing a leg negligently over the high seat, to chat at ease, punctuating his remarks with: "Steady, Molly!" "What you doin', Sorrel?" "Oh, stand still, Molly! Can't you flick a fly off without turning the rig over?"

"That syndicate fellow's still up in the hills with Moyes," he said, as a piece of chatter, reins over hooked elbow now, enjoying his noon snack. "They say Moyes is liable to sell him the Nellie Moyes prospect up on this here spur. More haulin' then, eh?"

And he looked up the precipitous hill that sheered away with the. trees standing at acute angles to it.

"That's where they've been, is it?" answered Bill. "I met them on the road a bit back, going toward Flannigan's. Wondered what they had been at to be so early on the road, and so far from Spring Lake.

"Did you? Moyes has an interest in some other location on the other side. I suppose they were crossing to it. If they ain't at Flannigan's when I get there, I guess that's where they'll be— up on the other side. They say that long fellow— I forget his name— Something-Smith— represents enough dough to open up all the claims in the country. He's seen the ore to Spring Lake in Moyes' office, and now he's looking where it comes from, so I guess he has intentions."

"Well, he's some rider!" said Bill. "His horse went bughouse as sudden as a knife, just after we met, and he gave an exhibition good enough to get honorable mention at Pendleton."

"Where was this?" asked Conyers, interested.

"Back some ways— you know that bend where there's the roots of a cedar?"

"Sure— kind of waggle up and down. About two miles this side of Flannigan's?"

"Sure!"

"Huh!" Conyers jerked a thumb at his horses. "They'll do the same at that bend— fierce. I never whale them for it; guess they were whaled there for something once. Goin' along light with them I sometimes wish I was carrying a jag on the wagon to stop a team of six, let alone two."

Bill merely nodded, but his face was full of thought.

"Sure," said Conyers. "I always begin a-talkin' comforting to them a bit ahaid. As a matter of fact, I don't like the place myself."

"Neither do I," answered Bill, and nodded again. For some reason, he seemed to see Flannigan again, and that drab barroom, with the mocking checkerboard in the corner, the disconsolate, rejected, dejected, inviting, and repellent checkerboard.

"Well, guess I'd better be pulling out," said Conyers— and did so, toward Midway, while Bill hauled onto the road once more and continued his joggle and swing to Spring. Lake.

But what Conyers had said about his horses getting restive at that place two miles above Flannigan's stayed with Bill, and brought him back to the depression that he had generally left far behind by this time. It struck him that the whole way was oppressive — the quiet, hushed forest, the winding, muffled road, grim and terrible, as if something queer might happen anywhere. He was in a mood to quit the job and pull out for a brighter bit of country, more open, more colored ; but anon the mood departed.

"Something at that bend, I guess, is unpleasant for horses," he thought.

He did not admit that it was particularly unpleasant for at least one human being— namely Bill Davies. An open-air man, he felt, without being consciously introspective.

iii

IT HAPPENED that on his return trip from Spring Lake to Ridge he had occasion to walk that bit of road alone, not even in the company of horses. With the end of the sunset he had come to the place the" horses did not like, wrestled with them, coaxed them, and had just sighted, from the hillside, the camping ground at Midway when he noticed that there had happened to him what had never happened before: his big sack of feed, from which he filled the nose bags of his hefty Montanas, had joggled off.

Back went his thoughts over the road, and he guessed he knew where it lay. It had fallen off when he wrestled with the animals at their place of fears and sweats. Well, he would drive down to the meadow and then return for it, for the load was heavy, the horses were tired, and the meadow was in sight. So down he drove to his wonted camp place, and there unhitched. The horses looked round for their nose bags, wondering what had come to their human partner of the road.

"All right," said Bill Davies. "I guess I dropped the grub. There! You stop there ; I'll hike back and fetch it."

A plainsman would have spraddled over even a draft horse for that couple of miles' hike back on the road, but Bill, feeling stiff in the limbs after his day on the elevated seat, thought to stretch his legs. Away he went uphill again, the two beasts turning, puzzled, to look after him. He swung off stiffly, but soon fell into a plodding stride, and dissipated his exasperation at himself for having dropped the bag in the exercise of walking to find it.

Hints of night were all around. It would be here soon. At this place, on the hill up from Midway, there were generally many chipmunks disporting; now but one or two chirped and ran and again chirped thinly, knowing that night was near. On Bill trudged, enjoying his walk still, though to be sure he was pleased to hear the silver notes of a bobolink, as if addressed to him. They were antidote to the dark-red, dark green infestivity of the slopes.

Up on the hillside, in the forest, he turned and looked down between the trees. He could still see the wagon, with the horses at the tail, waiting for their oats. They looked small from here, but he could even make out that they were still turned toward him— or turned in the direction in which he had departed— by the white of their foreheads. The meadow was going drab, the green fading. A shadow seemed to be drifting across it. The horses moved from the wagon to make shift on grass, as if they were unpampered cayuses instead of oat-suppered heavyweights. No light yet showed where Flannigan's stood to one side, backed by trees— but perhaps it was not yet time for lights.

Away up on high a peak showed over the trees with a sullen glow still on it. In the woods, however, night was fast getting to business. Bushes merged in darkness, a drifting, subtle darkness; they did not stand forth — they merely bulked, deeper glooms.

And then, just before he reached the bend, something suddenly happened to Bill Davies in his inner parts; and there were little shivers came over him— for he felt that he was being looked at.

He pshawed aside this inexplicable feeling, told himself that night was falling a bit cold, and puckered his eyes more keenly to see where the dropped sack lay. These shivers he had not felt since childhood, in the dark of a little loft over a farm in Indiana, where he had been "raised." He told himself again that night was going to be chilly. He could still see ahead, though the cleared cut of the road had a very lonesome appearance now, with the woods so darkened.

Say! He must get over this queer feeling of being looked at! He was just at that bend where his horses had been walloped once by a former teamster. Somebody was looking at him! And, say, not only his horses were like that here! What was it Conyers had said to him about the place ? He peered left and right as he walked. It occurred to him that it would be dark before he could get back to the meadow. He should have brought a lamp. A man might — well, a man might stub a toe, for instance.

Pshaw ! There was nothing to stub a toe on. A man had only to keep walking in the deep dust of the road. He looked left and right, and hiked on. He was at the bend; some one was looking at him— and then his foot, in stepping out, impinged on something soft that yielded; and he leaped aside.

The breath jumped out of him. He thought it was a body he had blundered onto; but it was only what he had come for, the sack of horse feed! He took it up. He flung it over his shoulder. He started incontinently to hike back. He wanted to run, and, of course, would not; but he was being looked at— and from behind now.

Night had fallen, and up in the mountains a long howl wavered— a coyote saluting the sure night. The shivers ran again in Bill Davies' spine, and he could explain them to himself this time— not with utter conviction, however— as being caused by that unwarned and dismal cry. Any fellow feels the melancholy unpleasantness of coyotes' howls, be he lean or fat, town bred or mountain bred.

He was being looked at! No, no, he was not! He told himself he was not— and believed that he was. Here was the meadow glimmering gray, and mighty glad he was to see it. He had never known two such unpleasant miles. There were a few stars beginning to show. Here was the meadow with a sense of openness, and here were the white faces of his horses; here was their whinnying greeting; and a little later there was the sound of their munching, the sound of the crackling camp fire, the sizzling bacon, and the appetizing odor of it.

Across the meadow, Flannigan's light now showed. Nearer, there was another wavering light coming into being. Evidently some other teamster had out-spanned there, on the way to Spring Lake from Ridge. Bill wanted lots of dancing light that night, and he flung on much wood after supper. If all the teamsters in the Rockies outspanned in the meadow at Midway, each with his own fire, Bill Davies would welcome them. Soon he heard gentle whistling. Men advancing on another camp are wont to come with noise, a sneeze or a cough, a deliberate tramping on a fallen branch, a whistling or humming of a bar of song. Bill shaded his eyes from the firelight and stared into the darkness.

"Hello, Jim!" he cried.

Jim Conyers roamed into view.

"Well, it's you, Bill," he said. "I guessed it would be. How you makin' out ? You look lonesome," and he filled his pipe. Bill was lonesome. He had never been so glad of a companion at the Midway camp in all his journeying through the country. He put on another can of tea for hospitality's sake, and just as he was measuring out the leaves, a shot rang sharply in the night.

"What's that?" snapped Jim; and, leaping up, he peered in the direction of the little sparkle and twinkle that showed where his own camp lay across the pocket,

"It was at Flannigan's," said Bill, and wondered why his voice sounded thick. But though his voice was thick, he felt he must find out what the shot meant. Both men knew that a shot from Flannigan's at this time of night was not right.

"Better go over," said Bill.

"Maybe cleanin' gun and it loaded," said Jim. "Maybe shot himself."

"Better go over," said Bill again.

They hit across the meadow to the sparkle of light in the window, and then suddenly the door of Flannigan's flung back, and there was a dancing dervish of a figure in the light, waving its hands. It was before the days when chinks cut off their cues, and the cue of this figure let them know that it was Flannigan's chink, agitated, in the doorway. He seemed to be in flight, then spun round, halted, retreated back into the light; then the light was shut off abruptly ; the door had closed again.

"Huh!" a perplexed grunt came from each of the men, and they strode smartly across the meadow. When they came to the old hotel they walked to the window of one accord, walked stealthily now, and looked in. What they saw was the chink wringing his hands on the hither side of the bar; and on the other side were two men stooping as if to lift something.

"It's a holdup!" cried Jim. "You ain't heeled by any chance, Billy?"

"No."

"Might run a bluff, if we do it properly, but—"

The two men who were lifting the burden were suddenly revealed as they rose, humped up.

"It's Captain Moyes!" Jim broke out.

"And the young engineer from the East that's looking at them prospects," said Bill.

They were lifting Flannigan. They raised him to the bar; they felt his heart, looked at him, looked at each other. The engineer, frowning, spoke a lot, as if hurriedly.

"We'll go in," said Bill.

hey opened the door and entered— and the first thing that Bill noticed was the checkerboard lying on the floor face downward, and the men, black and white, scattered broadcast. The three living inmates swept round at their entrance. Flannigan's hotel seldom saw boys dropping in long after dark now. Twenty-five years ago it was different. Even Captain Moyes started.

"Hello, boys!" said he, recovering. "Pity you didn't come in sooner— for witnesses."

"Oh, it's clear enough," said the tall man. "Look at the way he grabbed his gun. And we have one witness in the Chinaman."

"It was the chink I was thinking of," replied Moyes in low tones. "He might swear you did it."

"What's the racket?" asked a voice. It was Bill's. He recognized it after it was out. He had a feeling that everything was going to be explained when he saw the checkerboard upside down at last, the squares hidden, the men scattered. He no longer felt that queer, haunting sense in the place.

Moyes turned to Thompson-Smith, as if expecting him to reply to Bill's question, and that gentleman said:

"It is only the end of a long job. There was a man came into this country over a year ago, and was lost sight of — my brother. I never thought we were like each other, but other people did "

"He did," broke in Moyes meaningfully.

"How's that?" said Conyers.

"He says that because of what happened just now," answered Smith. "You see, my brother didn't show up again, and he had no reason, that I knew, for not showing up again. He wrote to me once or twice from Ridge. He was going up in the mountains prospecting. Then I never heard from him again. I came West a month or two ago to sec if I could trace him. They knew of him at the assay office, in Ridge, and he had registered a claim on Palliser Creek, up there. Then I got hold of Captain Moyes. He had met my brother in the hills, and thought he could find me a place he had been doing some work in. We visited the registered claim. He hadn't been there for a long time. Then we hunted over the hills where Captain Moyes knew he had been working last year. We found his camp, all right, and a bit of a tunnel. It looked as if he had intended to come back to it. Of course, a man might have a reason for cutting off from his family, and all old friends, a reason that his own people didn't know; but when we saw that camp, Captain Moyes and I made sure that my brother had intended coming back to it. Of course, men do go into the hills, and never come back; men have accidents

"Plenty men have," said Moyes; "but, all the same—"

"All the same," went on Smith, "we argued from that camp that he intended to come back to it. He hadn't run away from anything, I thought. That camp let me know that it was worth while making inquiries for him. Captain Moyes suggested that he got his supplies from Flannigan, not from Spring Lake. This is so much nearer, you see. His last camp was just up there," and Smith waved a hand. Bill noticed that he looked white and tired.

"Anyhow, we rode down here this evening. We didn't see Flannigan "

"Sleeping off his tanglefoot," put in Moyes.

"We had supper, and as there was nothing to do but checkers, we sat down to play. Flannigan evidently thought fit to get up for the evening, then, just half an hour ago. He came in to the bar, and— Well, I never saw anything like it!"

"How's that ?" said Bill, in a strained voice.

"Oh," answered Moyes, "he just stared at Mr. Smith, here, and then went crazy. That man was sodden with tanglefoot, only needed a shock to put him off his balance. He just started cackling: 'What you doing there? What you doing there— when I not only shot you, but buried you!' Up jumps Mr. Smith at that. I thought he was done for. Yes, sir"— he turned to Smith— "I thought you were done for when he grabbed under the bar. I knew that meant gun!"

"What happened?" Bill heard Conyers ask.

Smith inclined his head toward Moyes.

"We both jumped at him. Captain Moyes grabbed at his wrist "

"Shot himself?" said Conyers. Smith nodded.

"That's what!" answered Captain Moyes. "But what I want to know is why and how he killed your brother? And what did he mean about burying him?"

The Chinaman, now calmed down, was thinking of his own skin. He came a little nearer to the group.

"I tell you," he said. "Misa Flannig' he shoot him one night because this man he kill come in and eat suppah. I give him suppah. Misa Flannig' say, 'What you dlink?' This man he kill look at him, and say nothing at all. He look at him alle same he think Misa Flannig' hide to him. Misa Flannig' say, 'What you dlink?' again one time moah, moah lude, and this mart say, 'Dlink nothin',' he say, 'when you look at me like that.' Misa Flannig' him clazy. He come round and say he bleak this man head. This man say he guess not bleak, and he jump up — all same you did. They fight. This man knock Misa Flannig' back against ba'. Misa Flannig' reach over for gun, and shoot him."

The Chinaman paused, and Captain Moyes spoke hard and keen.

"Why in thunder didn't you tell the marshal?' he asked. "You've been in Melica long enough to know that, eh?"

"Oh, I scale— I scale. Misa Flannig' say if I tell he say I shoot the man. He say he shoot me. He say if I try to go away any time he follow me. He give me money every month. I wait for Misa Flannig' die — go back China, eh?" and he smiled a sickly and terrified smile.

"That's scare, all right— to the limit," said Moyes. "Where did he bury this man you tell me about ?"

"Oh, I not know."

"Come, now ! Guess you helped him. Guessed he scared you to help him, too."

"Yes, he scale me. He made me help cally him up on mountainside— some way along, and throw him back from wagon road. He say: 'Now, if bymby somebody catchum they think somebody hold him up on wagon road and shoot !"

"Where was this, then?"

Up on hill west," answered the Chinaman. "You no allest me! You no allest me!"

Moyes and Smith looked at each other.

"If he shows us, that's all, now, I suppose," said Smith, in a heavy voice. "I expect he was terrified. Anyhow, he didn't do it."

"I show you— I show you now. I take lamp and show you — not far, two mile up, off the road, and in a place all same gulch."

Bill Davies wet his lips, and then looked at Conyers. Conyers did not seem to associate his experiences two miles up with this story at all.

"We'll go up in the morning," said Captain Moyes.

"I'll show you— and you not have me allest?" whined the chink.

They turned from him, thoughtful.

"I don't want to sleep here to-night," said Moyes. "How about sleeping at you fellows' camp?"

"We ain't camped together," said Billy. "You come to my camp. You come over, too, Conyers. You go and fetch your blankets. We'll all camp together." There was a note of something like somber hilarity in his voice. He was not "scaled," but this business was different from anything that had ever happened in his life. To Jim Conyers there might seem no association between that disposal of the murdered man and the funk of the horses up there; but to him there was. And he was further silenced over the way in which the whole thing had come out.

He was a quiet man that night, pondering two themes: First, the way the horses felt and the way he had felt up at the bend, that very night; second, the way that checkerboard has been mixed up in the affair. Had he, as well as a keen sense to the presence of that body up there, also the gift of second-sight? Did he, subconsciously, every time he saw that checkerboard, have a knowledge that through it would come the exposal? It was all too deep for him. But he felt, assuredly, that he had got mixed up not superficially, but deeply, with a side of things that could not be seen, touched, bumped into.

In the morning, he did not go up with Moyes and Smith to "look see" with the Chinaman. He waited at the meadow till they and Conyers returned. And then he did not need to ask. He read it on their faces. Only when he climbed to his seat to pull out for Ridge, and Conyers gathered his reins to pull out for Spring Lake, did Bill say to Jim : "Was it at the place where the horses get scared?"

"Yes," said Conyers. "Just off the road there. There's a kind of gulch back a few yards, a sudden drop. There was nothing left— the coyotes had seen to that. Yes, sir, I guess the horses are wise to that crack there. Horses have a sense we don't have about some things, I guess. They're scared of getting off the wagon road and down that bit of precipice we can't see for bush. Never knew it was there myself."

Though Bill thought Conyers' explanation very lame, compared with his own, he did not think that Conyers was exactly fruitful soil for his nebulous theory, so he left it unspoken. But he took special note that the next time he passed the bend the horses seemed hardly to know they had arrived at the spot of their terrors. They fidgeted a little, but went on easily ; and on the way back, a day or two after still, they passed, unheeding, with no shivers, no veerings at all, no signs of funk.

_____________________

21: Signals of Storm

Raoul Whitfield

1896-1945

Black Mask, June 1930

HARNVILLE BRUSHED a bit of loose tobacco from his immaculate duck suiting, half closed his brown eyes and smiled. He sat in the most comfortable fan-backed chair in the Civilian Club, and that fact annoyed Jo Gar. His own wicker was not uncomfortable, but he much preferred the one on which the Englishman rested his long body. Harnville said in his precise, soft voice:

“Certainly I am offering you sufficient money. It is only a two-day journey— there is an inter-Island boat sailing tomorrow. You would be very comfortable.”

Jo Gar nodded. “That is probably quite true,” he agreed. “But you do not seem to care to give me the details. I do not like traveling about in the typhoon season— if you would tell me exactly what it is there would be for me to do, perhaps I might go. Otherwise—”

He shrugged. Harnville frowned at him. He said with impatience in his tone:

“I haven’t been to the plantation for three months. Two men have been killed there. I do not like the looks of things— it would be good to have you go out there. I can’t tell you what the exact trouble is. You need only be gone a week or so.”

Jo Gar smiled pleasantly. But he shook his head. His slightly almond-shaped eyes were almost closed. He ran stubby brown fingers through his gray hair.

“It is starting to blow tonight,” he said quietly. “The Number Three typhoon signal has been hoisted. I do not like the small inter-Island steamers in these storms. You are not definite enough, Mr. Harnville. These deaths might have been accidental. No, I prefer to remain in Manila.”

The tall Englishman got slowly to his feet. He frowned down at the diminutive Island detective. He said nastily:

“You have had some luck— and you now can choose what to do. I congratulate you.”

He bowed sardonically. Jo Gar continued to smile, but the expression in his gray-blue eyes was not so pleasant.

“It is nice to be congratulated, Mr. Harnville,” he said. “But I feel unworthy.”

Harnville turned away, went towards the screened doors of the Civilian Club. Jo Gar watched him go with narrowed eyes. He heard the man call loudly for his car; it seemed to him that Harnville was always shouting at the Filipino he had trained as a driver.

Wind, coming in rising gusts, rattled the windows of the Civilian Club. It was still warm, but it was growing cooler. This was the first typhoon of the season. Outside the Club he could see the shapes of palms bending in the wind that blew over the Bay. He had the feeling that the storm would be severe.

He smoked a brown-paper cigarette, rose slowly and strolled towards the patio. Outside the air was cool and filled with the sweetish odor of tropical growth. The water of the Bay, on which the Club patio fronted, was roughed up. Jo Gar could see the white-caps in the faint light that reached the sand from the Club. He stepped down from the porch, moved along the path. A gust of wind rocked his slight frame; he turned his head to the right. His keen eyes caught a faint movement beyond the palms that swayed close to the path, there was something white— a flash of it.

Jo Gar took one step forward. He called out, rather sharply, in English:

“Hello, there!”

Something white flashed again. The Island detective was rocking back on his heels now. He let the gust of the typhoon gale carry him backward. There was a faint hiss— his blown coat material ripped, jerked. With one movement he had the knife pulled from the cloth— it had slashed through the pongee until the hilt had caught.

He turned towards the swaying palms. For seconds he hesitated. Then he swung around, moved back towards the Club patio. The light was uncertain. He would be foolish to take chances in the fairly thick growth of palm.

Inside the Club he went to his favorite chair. He was calm enough, though he felt suddenly let-down. The blade of the knife had not even pricked his skin, but it had been a very narrow escape. There was no other human in the room; he inspected the weapon. It was small, with a tapered, thin blade. The handle of wood had been wrapped in native grass. The wrapping would make the matter of discovering fingerprints extremely difficult.

After a few minutes of examination he wrapped the knife carefully in a handkerchief, placed it in a pocket of his suit. He examined the tear in the material, smiling rather grimly. He finished one cigarette, lighted another. A small Filipino boy, very young, came into the room and called softly:

“Señor Gar.”

The Island detective rose. It was the telephone. He recognized Harnville’s voice. The Englishman spoke with something that approached a pleasantness of tone.

“I want to apologize for my hastiness in leaving you— and for my lack of politeness,” Harnville said. “As my chauffeur was passing the Manila Hotel I realized that my feelings had got beyond control. So I had him stop—and I am calling to apologize. Affairs at the plantation have worried me. I am sorry for being so abrupt.”

Jo Gar said: “I understand, Mr. Harnville. It is nothing— do not think more of it.”

Outside the small booth Jo Gar glanced at his watch. It was nine-fifteen. It had been about ten minutes since the Englishman had left him. That would give Harnville just about time to reach the Manila Hotel, at the far end of the Luneta. Just about time. Perhaps his driver had sped along. One thing was certain— Harnville had wanted him to know he was calling from the Manila Hotel. Had wanted someone to know.

Jo Gar got his soft straw, went outside and called for a carromatta. He gave the address, just off the Escolta, of the frame building in which he had an office. He relaxed in the seat back of the driver. When they got to the Luneta the wind rocked the cab. The rain was starting. As yet it was hardly more than a wind driven mist. Jo Gar murmured to himself:

“It will be a storm, perhaps bad. Harnville has never been friendly with me. Yet he is extremely anxious for me to go to his plantation. Native help are cheap. Why does he care about two deaths?”

The Island detective was smiling almost gently when the carromatta reached the address just off the Escolta. He paid the fare, went up to his small office. It was not a particularly comfortable place, he was seldom in it. The door was unlocked— the office was in darkness. But Gar’s ears were extremely sensitive; there was the breathing of a human. He snapped the switch— Juan Arragon was seated in the most comfortable of the two wicker chairs. He smiled at Gar.

“I have been seated in the dark, thinking,” he said. “Your office was not locked.”

The Island detective smiled. “It holds nothing of importance,” he replied. “Until you arrived, Juan, it was unimportant.”

The lieutenant of the Manila police grinned up at him. He said: “You have torn your coat, Jo.”

The Island detective nodded. “The wind is strong enough to blow one against things,” he replied.

Arragon smiled with his lips. “Sharp things,” he said. “Like knife blades.”

Jo Gar placed his hat on a small wicker table, seated himself near Juan and took the wrapped weapon from his pocket. He said as Juan gazed at it:

“I have enemies, Juan. That is too bad. But I have friends, also. I was offered a trip to an Island plantation. Two natives have died there— suddenly. There was a pleasant fee; it is nice to know you are trusted. But I decided not to go. On a path near the patio of the Civilian Club this knife came in contact with my coat. That is not nice.”

Juan Arragon widened his eyes. He said: “You did not catch the one who tossed it?”

Jo Gar smiled. “I do not chase knife throwers among palms, at night,” he replied. “You have been here long?”

The police lieutenant shook his head. “Not more than a half hour,” he rated. “I thought you would come here, after the news reached you.”

The Island detective said slowly: “The news has not reached me—what is it?”

Juan Arragon frowned. “I thought you had heard,” he said. “Sam Ying departed suddenly on the Toya Maru, for China.”

Jo Gar relaxed in his chair. Sam Ying was a wealthy Chinese, an extremely wealthy Oriental. For several years the police had been attempting to stop his traffic with various races in Manila. It was Sam Ying who furnished drink and dope to the poor, and accordingly became wealthy. It was Sam Ying who was to blame when a coolie went berserk and slashed other humans with a knife. But these facts the police had found it difficult to prove. And now Ying had gone away from the Islands.

“It is true— that is news,” Jo Gar stated. “But it appears to be good news. And why do you feel it would bring me here?”

Juan Arragon leaned forward in his wicker. He said quietly:

“You have been working against Ying for a month or so. There was a subscription taken up by several good citizens of Manila. You were selected by them to investigate Sam Ying’s affairs. So, I thought you would come to the office, after learning the news.”

Juan Arragon smiled and relaxed in the wicker chair. Jo Gar smiled, too. He glanced at the blade of the knife resting on the table, touched it with his browned fingers.

“The police are observant,” he said slowly. “It is so, of course. Perhaps, though, you do not think Sam Ying departed on the Toya Maru. Perhaps there was a Chinese aboard who somewhat resembled Ying, and who registered under Ying’s name. Perhaps you sent a radio to the vessel, and received a reply saying that the man aboard did not answer to your very complete description. And perhaps you have come to tell me that.”

Arragon widened his dark eyes on the gray-blue ones of the Island detective. He said:

“You think of too many things. But, it is so. The Sam Ying the police have been interested in is not aboard. We were curious, though we have no charges against him. We knew that you were more interested than we—you have aided us— I come to you.”

Jo Gar nodded. “It is good of you,” he said politely. “Have you any idea why Ying should be registered— and not aboard?”

Arragon shook his head. But his eyes held a peculiar expression.

He rose.

“There will be the usual storm troubles— I must go,” he said.

Jo Gar rose, too. He said quietly: “It is fortunate I did not agree to sail from Manila. Perhaps I would have missed something.”

Juan Arragon nodded. “It is fortunate the thrown knife did not strike your body,” he observed.

Jo Gar stopped smiling. He said quietly:

“Typhoon winds all blow towards a moving center. The center is quite calm. Perhaps Sam Ying is now dozing comfortably, not thinking of knives or trips to remote islands.”

Juan Arragon said: “Perhaps he will sleep a long time, Jo.”

Jo Gar shook his head. “He is worth much more alive,” he observed. “He will give much to remain so.”

The police lieutenant nodded. “There might have been a mistake, aboard the Toya Maru, of course. But I do not think so.”

Jo Gar smiled wearily. “Sam Ying was very much in love with that half-breed girl. I saw her on the Escolta, only a few hours ago. I do not think he would leave her so hurriedly, carelessly.”

Juan Arragon frowned. “Her name is Castrone— Rosa Castrone.

She lives on the Avenida—”

“I know,” Jo Gar interrupted quietly. “Perhaps I shall go there first. It is a quiet street— there would be less danger from knives that fly through the air.”

Arragon smiled with grim, small eyes. As he went out he said softly:

“A journey away from Manila might have been wiser, Jo.”

The Island detective nodded. “I am like the cock Rameriz had at the Casa Club, two weeks ago,” he said. “You remember— it was almost blind. It didn’t seem to know just where to leap. But it would not be beaten.”

Juan Arragon was at the head of the stairs now. He smiled at Jo Gar.

“You are not so blind, Jo,” he stated. The Island detective shrugged.

“I am not so blind as to make long journeys without knowing sufficient things,” he said. “I am not so blind as to walk into the path of a thrown knife.”

Arragon said: “Or to believe that our friend is really aboard the Toya Maru.”

Jo Gar chuckled. “That is where he would like to be, I think,” he said, and went back into his tiny office.

Rosa Castrone was a plump girl of perhaps twenty. She had blue eyes and blonde hair, but she was not the true Spanish type. She was half Filipino; her lips were too thick and her features too big. The house on the Avenida Mandiez was small and simply furnished; the boy had taken Jo Gar into a room that was filled with storm sounds. Rosa had come after a few minutes. They had spoken first of the storm. Now Jo said:

“I was surprised to learn that Sam Ying had departed so suddenly. We are friends. He has spoken of you. I think he is much in love with you, and I think he is to be envied. Will he return soon, do you know?”

She said quietly: “He will be back within the month. It was a business trip. But you are mistaken— Sam Ying is not in love with me. We have been just friends.”

Jo Gar widened his eyes. He decided that Rosa Castrone was lying. He said:

“I have money for him— quite a large amount. He has told me that should he suddenly go away you would act for him. He has no family in Manila, no relations.”

The girl was staring at him. She started to speak, but her lips closed tightly. Jo said:

“It is not always easy to raise a large sum of money hurriedly. That is why Sam Ying came to me and made arrangements. Perhaps he left some word with you, some address.”

Suspicion showed in her eyes. She shook her head. “I do not understand,” she said.

Jo Gar smiled. “I will be very definite,” he told her. “Sam Ying saw much of you before he departed. He did not depart, however, on the Toya Maru. A Chinese answering his description in a general way, and registering as Sam Ying did depart. Sam Ying is very wealthy, but his wealth was not all obtained strictly according to Island law.”

He stopped. He was still smiling, but Rosa Castrone had become sullen. Her eyes were narrowed on his. She shrugged.

“Sam Ying went to China,” she said. “That is all I know.” Jo nodded.

“Sam Ying has been kidnapped,” he stated quietly. “He is being held because he will not pay an amount of money. It is bad of you not to pay it.”

She laughed harshly. She turned her back on him and walked towards a window, the shutters of which were drawn. The wind was singing through the palms beyond the house—the avenida was fringed with them. Suddenly she faced him.

“Why do you say that?” she flared. “Why is it bad of me not to pay it? You have just said that you have money for him—that he came to you and made arrangements. Why do you not—”

She stopped abruptly. The expression in Jo Gar’s eyes stopped her. He was smiling in a cold mocking way.

“So you do admit that someone must pay money?” he said in a quiet tone. “Ying is not then aboard the Toya Maru?”

There was hatred in her eyes. She was breathing heavily.

“I do not know what you are saying,” she said. “You are not of the Island police— they do not want Sam Ying. You have not been sent for, Señor Gar. It is late in the evening— all I know is—”

She hesitated. Then she shrugged her rather thick shoulders. “Sam Ying has gone to China,” she said. “He sailed on the Toya

Maru.”

Jo Gar bowed just a little. He was smiling almost pleasantly.

“I am sorry to have made you admit that he is being held for a large sum of money,” he stated. “He is in an unfortunate position— he cannot call for the police. Perhaps he was himself forced to go to the steamship office and register for the journey he did not make. Sam Ying is himself beyond the law.”

Rosa said sharply: “What do you care? What does it matter to you? You would be anxious to bring charges against him. He gave you no money— you are keeping none for him. He never went to you. You have lied to me!”

The Island detective smiled, shrugged his narrow shoulders. He said:

“You have lied to me.” He moved close to her; his eyes were on hers. “So has Mr. Harnville.”

For a second he was sure fear flickered in the blue of her eyes— and then she was staring at him almost stupidly. He moved away from her, but he did not turn his back.

“If Sam Ying was being held— and you were to blunder— he would be killed,” she said suddenly.

Jo Gar frowned at her.

“That would be unfortunate,” he replied, “for you.”

She cried out shrilly, in a rage:

“What have I— to do with it?”

He smiled at her. He shrugged. At a sharp clap of his hands the house-boy came pattering into the room. Jo Gar beckoned to him. The boy came to his side. He was very small, with large, black eyes. He looked very innocent.

With a swift movement the Island detective slipped the wrapped knife from his pocket.

He unwrapped it— held it towards the house-boy. “Yours?” he said.

The boy reached for the weapon. His face was expressionless. There was no fear in his eyes. His hands were steady. He said slowly:

“She not mine— mine out back.”

Jo Gar grinned. Rosa Castrone was standing near a tall cabinet of dark wood. She had gained control of herself; her eyes met the Island detective’s. They held a mocking expression. Jo said:

“But you do dress your house-boy in khaki colored clothes, not white?”

She straightened. “I dress him in khaki,” she said defiantly. “He is a good boy. I dress him as I please. I do not want you here—”

Jo Gar took the knife from the boy’s brown fingers. He said: “I would have gone sooner had you not lied to me.”

She made a clicking sound with her tongue and mouth. It denoted disgust. She motioned to the boy; he went into the small hall, stood near the door that led to the street. Jo Gar said, quietly: “The typhoon is growing more severe— it will be bad for the houses along the Bay.” She said nothing. Jo Gar went out and moved towards the caleso whose driver was huddled down in the seat trying to protect himself from wind and rain. The Island detective did not like machines; he preferred a pony hauled carromatta to the caleso. But a horse got along better in wind and rain.

He instructed the driver to take him back to the Escolta, to cross the Bridge of Spain, skirt the Walled City and drive towards the Bay. The Filipino grumbled; he did not like the wind. But he drove. Jo Gar leaned back in the seat behind. He murmured to himself:

“Sam Ying is no good. He has been kidnapped. Mr. Harnville, I think, is involved. He compliments me by seeking to have me leave Manila. I refuse—a knife is thrown. Very shortly after this Mr. Harnville phones me. Perhaps he is surprised to hear my voice. Perhaps he expected another to answer, in which case he would make sure that person knew he had called, and the exact hour. He felt that he might need an alibi.”

The caleso rocked as a gust of wind caught it. The Filipino shrilled words at the horse. Rain slapped against the wood of the carriage. They were nearing the Escolta. Jo Gar lighted a cigarette with difficulty. He settled back in the seat.

“Sam Ying is being held for ransom but I do not think he will be released when it is paid. Rosa Castrone would like to talk, but she is afraid. I do not think she knows where Sam Ying is a prisoner. Perhaps Mr. Harnville does. Perhaps he is not afraid to talk—”

The Island detective hunched down in the seat, allowed his body to sway with the caleso. His thin lips were pressed tightly together. Twenty minutes later, as the caleso stopped before the palm fringed path of the Harnville house, he smiled at the driver and tipped generously. He was in a good humor. In the wind swayed caleso an idea had come to him— either a very good or a very bad idea.

A Spanish servant opened the door, showed him to a large room that faced the Bay. The house shook under the blasts of wind; Jo Gar was breathing heavily from his short walk up the path. He waited for almost ten minutes before Harnville entered. The Englishman was carefully dressed in duck; he was freshly shaven. But he frowned at Jo.

“A bit late, isn’t it, Señor Gar?” he asked. “Getting along toward midnight.”

Jo nodded. He smiled pleasantly. “I am sorry,” he said. “I’ve come to ask you about Sam Ying.”

Harnville looked puzzled. “Ying?” he muttered. “That fat chink who peddles the bad stuff around the Pasig?”

Jo nodded again. “It is the gentleman,” he said. “He is extremely obese.”

Harnville frowned. “You come to me at this hour of the night to talk about a chink!” he said, raising his voice. “What would I know about Ying?”

The Island detective shrugged. “Perhaps you know he left on the Toya Maru, for China,” he said slowly.

A slow smile spread across Harnville’s long face. “That isn’t a secret, is it?” he asked.

Jo Gar shook his head. He said in a very quiet tone.

“You are not surprised to learn that. I did not think you would be. But Sam Ying did not sail on the Toya Maru.” He smiled as Harnville stared at him. “He sailed on the Parambigue, a small steamer. She is now just making the Straits.”

Harnville was blinking at the Island detective. He started to say something, stopped. His long fingers were working nervously. With an effort he made a gesture with spread hands.

“What has all this to do with me?” he muttered. Jo Gar said:

“I will be very frank. You have little liking for Sam Ying. You own river boats— many of them. You did not think Ying paid enough for their use. There was a quarrel— and Ying got his boats elsewhere. You were losing money, and that did not suit you. You tried to prevent Sam Ying from using other river boats. A few bancas and sampans were sunk. These things are known.”

Harnville had a sneer playing around his lips. He looked down at the diminutive detective.

“What of it?” he demanded. “It’s a bit stiff— your coming here at this hour to tell me this.”

Jo Gar smiled.

“You were anxious to get me away from Manila— and there would have been only an untruthful reason for my going. You left me— and very soon after, a knife was thrown at me. And very soon after that you telephoned me, establishing the fact that you were at the Manila Hotel and could not have been near me when the knife was thrown.”

Harnville chuckled. “You traced my call— to make certain?” he asked mockingly.

Jo Gar shook his head. “I believed you,” he said simply. “You do not believe me. You do not think Sam Ying is aboard the Toya Maru. You are right. The substitute you placed aboard is on that ship. But you do think Sam Ying is being held a prisoner, in Manila. You are wrong. Ying is a very ordinary appearing Chinese. Many resemble him. You had little difficulty finding one who resembled him. It was also simple for Ying to do the same.”

Harnville stood motionless, his eyes on Jo’s. It was evident that he wanted to speak. But he did not. Jo Gar said:

“It is difficult, isn’t it? You want to tell me that I am very wrong. That you have kidnapped the right person. Your pride desires that. But you do not wish to admit that you are at all involved. That is foolish— Rosa Castrone has talked.”

Fear showed in Harnville’s eyes. He took a step towards the Island detective. The fear went from his eyes as he moved. Rage was gripping him. He said:

“I know Sam Ying— I know him better than you do—”

Jo Gar was smiling coldly. Harnville got control of himself. He smiled, too. It was a nasty, hating smile.

“I saw friends off on the Toya Maru— Sam Ying was aboard her. You are trying to frame me, Señor Gar.”

Jo shook his head. “My interest is in Sam Ying,” he said quietly. “He is safely away, sailing towards his native land. I merely wanted to advise you that you are holding for ransom a substitute. Kidnapping is a serious crime.”

He bowed. He said slowly: “I do not think you have seen this man you hold. You have been too busy in other places. Sam Ying is a wise man. He knew that if you were to hold him for a large sum of money he could not call on the police. He is not anxious to expose the reason for such kidnapping— the boats were not used lawfully on the Pasig. So he went away. Last night several men broke into his house and took away a substitute, sleeping in Ying’s bed. Sam had already sailed. This morning you put aboard a fat Chinese who somewhat resembled Ying. That was not a bad idea, but mine was better.”

He moved away from the tall Englishman. Harnville was smiling.

He said in a mocking tone:

“It’s the most idiotic thing I’ve heard. Perhaps you accuse an accomplice of mine with throwing a knife at you from the palms?”

Jo Gar faced the taller man. He said in his toneless voice:

“Why do you say ‘from the palms’? I did not designate the spot from which the knife was thrown.”

Harnville’s face was white. He said harshly:

“I heard about it— at the Club. I’ve been there—”

The Island detective nodded. “I see,” he said. “I should be very careful, Mr. Harnville. Kidnapping is unwise— murder is more unwise.”

He went towards the door. Harnville stared after him, followed him to the door. The wind was blowing fiercely. Harnville said:

“You are very wrong— I shall go to the Island police in the morning.

The idea of your coming here at this hour—”

His words were lost as wind rushed into the house. Jo Gar pulled the door shut back of him, slanted his body into the typhoon gusts. He was smiling grimly. A half block from the Bay he found the caleso. The driver was standing in the shelter of the carriage, muttering to himself. Jo Gar smiled at him. He reached into a pocket of his light suit, now wet with the rain, gave the man a handful of silver. He said:

“I am of the police— turn your caleso and drive slowly towards the Bay. Swear at your horse loudly as you near the house on the right. If no one comes out, descend and work over the harness. I think someone will come and ask you to drive to some spot not many miles distant. Do so. If the man asks about such a person as me, say only that you passed another caleso going towards the Walled City as you drove out. Carry the person to the spot he wishes— attempt to see what house he enters. Then drive to Fernandez’ café off the Escolta, and report to me. There will be more silver for you.”

The driver’s eyes brightened. He nodded. He looked fairly intelligent. As he turned his caleso Jo Gar went across the street to the grounds of the Church of the Sisters. Palms protected him from eyes of a human riding in a caleso. The wind sang through them. After a few minutes he heard the clatter of the horses shoes— the caleso came past. The horse was running swiftly, a match flared behind the driver. Jo could not see the passenger. But he smiled faintly.

“Perhaps Mr. Harnville is stupid,” he murmured to himself. “He is wise to think that his machine would be recognized. But he is stupid to think that I would not think he would prefer a caleso.”

Arragon, crouched beside Jo Gar, shook his head from side to side. The rain slapped against his ancient raincoat. He perspired, though it was not warm in the tangle of tropical growth across from the house in which only one light showed. He muttered:

“Harnville— the Englishman! Are you sure you are not mistaken, Jo?”

The Island detective shrugged.

“I am seldom sure of anything,” he said. “The caleso driver has said this is the house. If he does not come out soon, we will go inside.”

Arragon nodded. That was more to his liking. The lieutenant of Manila police preferred action to thought. He was often too anxious. Thus, he had often failed where Jo Gar, proceeding in an almost sleepy manner, had succeeded. Jo suited his action to the climate of the Islands. Manila was not New York, or San Francisco.

Rain dripped from the foliage— the wind sang a steady song. The street between their hiding place and the house with the one light showing in an upper window was one not far from the center of Manila. It was a bad district— low caste Chinese and Filipinos occupied the frame houses. They were small houses— strong gusts of the typhoon wind seemed almost to rock them.

Jo Gar said:

“I think we shall go inside. We will go openly— you stay in the rear. I will knock upon the door.”

They moved across the dimly lighted street. Juan Arragon went around to rear—Jo knocked on the dark wood of the door. He stood with his right hand fingers touching the grip of his Colt lightly. His eyes moved constantly. No one came. He knocked again. When they broke open the door, five minutes later, there was no sound from within. The house was poorly furnished. There were crude toys scattered about— no humans were about. Juan Arragon said:

“I will ask questions, next door.”

When he returned he said that a Chinese family rented the house. They had many children and had been in the provinces for several days. The neighbors knew little about them.

Jo Gar shrugged. “Harnville was clever— or the caleso driver lied,” he said simply. “There is no typhoon cellar in the place.”

Juan Arragon muttered to himself. They went outside the house, after bracing the broken door securely. Juan said:

“Perhaps you were wrong, Jo— perhaps Harnville did not leave his residence. Perhaps this time it is you who have worked too rapidly.”

The Island detective smiled grimly. He replied: “More likely I have not worked rapidly enough, Juan.”

The lieutenant shrugged. “Sam Ying is of little importance, in any case,” he stated.

Jo Gar nodded.

“Others are of more importance,” he agreed. “Others interest me.” Juan Arragon was frowning. “It is like seeking a ghost,” he said. “The name of Sam Ying is registered aboard the Toya Maru, after all.”

Jo Gar smiled. He pointed beyond the house near which they were standing.

“An eighth of a mile distant is the home of Rosa Castrone,” he said. “With a key a man could let himself in the front of this house. He could then go out by the rear, cut across between other houses, and reach the Castrone home very quickly. Let us go there.”

Juan Arragon sighed. “When one has blundered, it is better to start afresh,” he said. “I do not think Rosa Castrone would like Harnville. She loves Sam Ying— and Harnville has long been Ying’s enemy. Why would the Englishman go to her?”

Jo Gar smiled with his narrow lips pressed together.

“It is one of the facts we will perhaps learn,” he said softly, and they turned their backs to the gusts of wind blowing in from the Bay.

The bell tinkled under pressure from Jo Gar’s fingers. No lights showed in the house— the Avenida Mandiez was deserted. There were faint sounds inside now; they reached the two men on the porch against the shrill of the wind. A voice said in native tongue:

“Who is there?”

Juan Arragon replied, “Open quickly. It is the police.”

The latch snapped. A light flashed on. They stepped inside. The Filipino boy that Jo had questioned blinked sleepily at them. Jo Gar said in a hurried, breathless tone:

“Quick— we have just received word! The center of the typhoon— is almost here. You have a cellar?”

Fear shone in the boy’s eyes. He muttered to himself in his native tongue. He was calling upon the saints. A gust of wind rattled the windows, shook the house. Juan said:

“Hurry— there is little time. The storm is terrible—”

The boy was afraid. But he was fighting something. Jo Gar caught him by an arm.

“You have a typhoon cellar here!” he said grimly. “Take us there!”

The house-boy was shaking his head from side to side. He cried out in terror:

“There is no— typhoon cellar—”

The Island detective said fiercely to Arragon:

“He’s hiding something. Rosa told me this was one of the few houses that has one, in this section. We will all be killed— the house isn’t strongly built—”

Arragon drew his gun suddenly. The house trembled under a gust of the wind. The police lieutenant jammed the gun muzzle against the house-boy’s right side.

“Quick!” he ordered. “Take us— down!”

Something was ripped loose, on the roof. It crashed against the side of the house. The wind was shrilling. The house-boy moved away swiftly—Jo Gar following. Arragon followed him. They went through a bedroom, into a closet. The house-boy pointed towards the flooring. Jo Gar whispered:

“You pull on the ring— you go down first—”

The house-boy glanced towards the gun Arragon was holding. He pulled on the ring— the square of wood came up. His body was vanishing from sight now. There was the crash of a gun. The house-boy screamed; his body slipped from the ladder.

Jo Gar dropped downward. He heard the gun crash again— cloth of his left coat sleeve jerked. His feet struck soft earth. He was up— his right hand gripped his gun. And then he heard the hiss of the knife. He caught a glimpse of the house-boy’s right arm. A figure ten feet away uttered a choking cry. There was a whining cry from a woman.

Jo Gar got to his feet. He stared towards the figure of Harnville. The knife had caught him in the side; he was pressing his palms against his coat material, groaning. He said:

“You damn— half-breed!”

Jo Gar went over and kicked his gun to one side. Juan Arragon said:

“The house-boy’s all right— you shot too soon, Harnville.”

Jo Gar looked at the girl. Her face was white— there was terror in her blue eyes. The Island detective said:

“Where is Sam Ying, Rosa?”

She motioned with her head. The light in the typhoon cellar was dim. Jo Gar went past her and looked down at the bound figure of the Chinese. He removed the gag from Sam Ying’s mouth— the man-made guttural sounds. Jo Gar looked at Harnville. He said slowly: “You were right, Harnville. It isn’t a substitute. You did get Sam Ying, at that.”

The Englishman pressed his hands against his side and gritted out words. “You knew that damn well— when you tricked me into coming here to make sure I had him!”

Jo Gar smiled almost cheerfully. “I am glad you did not think of that until this moment,” he said quietly.

Juan Arragon and Jo Gar sat in the police lieutenant’s office. The typhoon was less severe now; the center was not expected to pass over Manila. It would not be a tremendously damaging storm. It was almost three o’clock. Arragon was smoking a small cigar; Jo fingered one of his brown-paper cigarettes. He said slowly:

“Harnville was too anxious. He wanted to be sure. He wanted me away from Manila. That was because I have had some good fortune lately— and also because he knew I was watching Sam Ying. Ying had no use for me— he suspected that certain citizens had requested me to seek evidence against him. But Harnville’s idea was to have me go away— in case it was suspected that Ying had not sailed on the Toya Maru.”

Arragon nodded. “He had sworn that house-boy to secrecy,” he said. “When he dropped into the cellar Harnville didn’t care if he was a boy who had done much for him. He’d given away the hiding place— so Harnville fired. And the boy used his knife, though neither of them is much hurt.”

Jo Gar smiled. “Or perhaps he was afraid the boy might talk,” he suggested. “It was almost a confession, when he threw that knife. I knew then that it was he who tried to knife me. But I suspected it, in any case. He was wearing a white house coat when he tossed the knife. I’ve seen the boy before this, marketing with Rosa. He has always been dressed in white. Suddenly he wears khaki. But I could not be sure. That was insufficient evidence. It is the cool season; khaki is worn now. It was Harnville who betrayed things. First in trying to get me away by an offer. And then, so soon after the attempted knifing, he called me to apologize. It was not a natural act. But when he mentioned throwing a knife ‘from the palms’ I knew something was very wrong. I had not mentioned the palms to him or to anyone else.”

Juan Arragon nodded. He pulled on his little cigar.

“And there was the light he left in the empty house,” the police lieutenant said. “You did not speak of that.”

Jo chuckled. “Again, we could not be sure. His idea was that if he were followed it would be natural for the light to appear. He immediately slipped out the rear way, went to Rosa. They intended to get a large sum of money for Sam Ying. She is tired of him, and besides, he is too obese. Harnville thought that her typhoon cellar was an excellent place to hold the Chinese. The substitution was not difficult— Ying was kidnapped first.”

Arragon grinned. “As you say, most fat Chinese look alike,” he agreed. “And here in Manila there are many fat Chinese.”

Jo Gar shrugged. “My only chance was to cause him to betray himself— this Harnville,” he said. “He is not a good character. He has never liked me. Had I gone to his plantation I doubt that I should have returned. But I did not go. There were too many signals of storm. I preferred to cause him to believe that his aides had kidnapped a man substituted for Sam Ying. He knew that my clients were trying to deport Ying— and when I told him that the Chinese had sailed on the Parambigue he was worried. There was the ransom money involved— the money he hoped to obtain. He had to go to Rosa’s house, see for himself.”

Juan Arragon said: “It will not go easy with him, or with Rosa and the house-boy.”

Jo Gar shrugged his narrow shoulders. He rolled the brown-paper cigarette between his lips, said tonelessly:

“I think that this time Sam Ying will really sail for his native land.

He is a sick and frightened man. My clients will be glad.”

Juan Arragon smiled. “The typhoon helped us,” he mused. “Signals of storm, you say. But you had eyes for them. Your clients are often glad, Jo.”

The Island detective closed his eyes. There was a little smile showing on his lips.

“The saints are often good,” he said simply, “to those who help themselves.”

end

Table of Contents

- 1: The Sovereign of the Sea / Albert Richard Wetjen

- 2: The Last Touches / Mrs. W. K. Clifford

- 3: The Mystery of Sasassa Valley / Arthur Conan Doyle

- 4: Ashes of Circumstance / J. U. Giesy

- 5: The Malignant Entity / Otis Adelbert Kline

- 6: The Demon of Tlaxpam / Otis Adelbert Kline

- 7: An Arc of Direction / Junius B. Smith

- 8: The Case of Minna Lang / Charles Michael Williams

- 9: The Strange Adventure of Tommy Lawn / Albert Richard Wetjen

- 10: Pod Flits / George Allan England

- 11: The Letter With The Black Seal / John K. Leys

- 12: Proof of the Pudding / Aidan De Brune
- 13: The Wedding Cake / Aidan De Brune
- 14: Wiles of  Cho Chun / Aidan De Brune
- 15: A Question of Coke / Aidan De Brune
- 16: The Elusive Mr Chon / Aidan de Brune
- 17: Spring is Here / Will Rogers
- 19: Demons of the Cold / Raymond S. Spears
- 20: The Queer Place / Frederick Niven
- 21: Signals of Storm / Raoul Whitfield