PAST MASTERS

THIRTY-FOUR

July 2021

Produced by Terry Walker

("Pulpmeister")

Contents

1: The King's Pipe / H. Bedford-Jones

2: "To Every one His Own Fear" / Meade & Halifax

3: The Cripple at the Mill / Max Pemberton

4: The Hidden Egyptian Shield / Charles J. Mansford

5: Lady Florry's Gems / George Manville Fenn

6: The Dervish of the Nile Pyramid / Charles J. Mansford

7: Murder Needs No Motive / Robert L. Ahern

8: The Talking Horse / F. Anstey

9: A Night in the Kremlin / Clarence Herbert New

10: Bait, Hook and Sinker / William Almon Wolff

11: The Secret of Banda Sea / Clarence Herbert New

12: The Little Old Man of Batignolles / Émile Gaboriau

Cumulative Index 31-34

______________________

The fourteenth story the series "Warriors in Exile"

1: The King's Pipe

H. Bedford-Jones

1887-1949

The Blue Book Magazine July 1938

I WALKED INTO a blare of voices, a blue cloud of tobacco fumes, a redolent odor of the proper authority, and found myself in a gathering of "Anciens" of the Foreign Legion. Corrigan, whom I knew rather well, introduced me to the gang, as one who might be termed a friend if not a brother, and the talk went on. It was raucous and impolite.

"Gimme a cibiche— you smoked the last of mine, blast you!"

"I suppose you'll be sprawling under the table when Sidi Mahomet comes up?"

"Here's some Pernod; who'll have a caoudji with me? Allah! Don't take it all, you imbecile—"

However, toleration is the first law of society— toleration of Legion slang, of bawling oaths and insults given and taken in jest, of anything you please. Toleration, which men learn in a hard school.

The oldest man present said the least, until some one called on him for a toast. He was white-haired, thinly erect, vigorous despite his years. Corrigan leaned over to me.

"That's Wetzler— a Bavarian, I think. He was in the Legion before any of us. He has some of the damnedest stories you ever heard! Listen—"

Wetzler stood up, liquor banishing the pallor of his faded, lined cheeks, and raised his glass.

"Clink your glasses, comrades— to the Legion that destroyed the Amazons and dethroned a king, regardless of its own agony!"

If those final words, as I thought, held personal significance, it was lost in a roar of acclaim as the toast was drunk.

"What campaign was that?" some one demanded. "You mean real live Amazons— women fighting?"

"I do," said Wetzler dryly. "And could they fight! They were the bodyguard of Behanzin, king of Dahomey. They were armed with huge sabers, and when they chopped at a head, it went off ker-flop. They got in their daily exercise that way."

Somebody down the table grunted. "Oh, you mean that old Dahomey Campaign back in '92! A parade through the jungle for the Legion, a few casualties, and another slice of Africa under the Tricolor!"

Wetzler's eyes flashed. "It was no parade, my friend. A few casualties? Only a few hundred, true; but ten down with fever or dysentery for every one touched by a bullet. Tremendous losses, a march of sixty days on Abomey, the capital; every day of that march continual fighting, often hand-to-hand. And no jungle, either, but river marshes and tropical brush. And in those days, the Legion had adventurers in its ranks, men who played chess with kings for pawns, men who juggled life and death in either hand, and who laughed when they lost and paid!"

A ripple of applause greeted his peroration. He had something, that old fellow, and every one of us felt the power of him. My friend Corrigan spoke up.

"Wetzler, if there's a story back of all that, let's have it. We know the Legion of the war, of Syria, of Morocco; we're fed up with all that. Dahomey— that's a new one on me. What's the story, or is there one?"

More applause. As Wetzler looked around, decision came into his face.

"Yes!" he said almost defiantly. "A story to eat your hearts out— not my story, but that of Bauer. He was in my company; I knew him well. I know what happened to him. He had his head cut off— and yet he served with the Legion for another eight months and was discharged on our return to Algeria."

"What kind of a joke is that?" demanded a voice. "Are you serious? Or drunk?"

"I repeat," said Wetzler deliberately, "Bauer had his head cut off, yet was with the Legion in the rest of the campaign and may be alive yet for all I know."

"Oh! You mean magic, African magic, eh?" put in Corrigan.

Wetzler flashed him a look.

"I do not mean magic. I mean precisely what I say. The story's never been told, never been known, though snatches of it are in the records; it can do no harm to tell it now, if you want to hear it."

Everybody yelled assent, for those words of his had us all guessing. He stated a rank impossibility and had thrown out the only possible answer, that of magic or wizardry. And, while the wine of wizardry has always held allure for men, the necromance of the utterly impossible has always appealed peculiarly to the Legion. Yes, he had his audience, no doubt about that!

HE WENT ON TO TELL about Bauer, one of those contradictory persons who appear destined for a hangman's noose, yet whose evil natures are lit by flashes of nobility. Bauer had a terrifically bad record, in a day when the Legion was noted for such records. It was no secret that his name was assumed; but as he himself had morosely observed, his whole family was devil-marked.

Bauer was a big, strapping fellow with a wide brow, intelligent eyes, powerful features. Beards were then popular, in and out of the Legion. Bauer wore his curly brown beard cut square, just below his chin, and he was hairy to the eyes.

He was given to strange moods of depression or uplift. He could be a joyous singing giant or an unutterable brute; usually the latter. Liquor maddened him, and in a drunken rage he was simply a destroying fury. Nobody loved him except the woman he had married shortly before the marching battalion left Algeria—she was the daughter of a quartermaster at Oran and should have known better. The day they embarked, she showed up with a black eye and bruised lips to wave farewell.

Bauer did not like the prospect of central Africa, and he hated everyone around him; he spent half the voyage in cells, becoming more and more embittered against Lieutenant Friant. Surprisingly enough, he knew a good deal about Dahomey, though he refused point-blank to say how he knew. So extensive was his knowledge that the higher command took cognizance of it and he was frequently detailed to give information regarding maps and routes and customs. But one day, when he was in expansive mood, the colonel put the question to him and he explained:

"One of my family is there, or was. He has written home volumes about the place; the letters have interested me."

The general hope in the company was that Bauer would remain permanently in Dahomey. He had another year of his enlistment to serve, which meant that he had made life hell to those around him for six years, and they were tired of it.

The Legion battalion formed part of the Dodds column, formed to march up-country and definitely to extinguish King Behanzin and his bloody capital of Abomey, just beyond his sacred town of Kana. Behanzin had all but pushed the French colony into the sea, was actually on the outskirts of Porto Novo, and the march would assuredly be a continual fight, at least until the holy town of Kana was taken.

Nor was it any march against black savages. Behanzin had an army of close to ten thousand warriors, trained by Europeans and armed with repeating rifles. Germans were all through this country, and according to barracks gossip German traders had given the king not only arms in plenty, but even a few Krupp guns. What Dodds could do with his little column was problematical. After leaving requisite garrisons, he had only the Legion, a few marines, and native troops—Senegalese and Haussas, some two thousand all told.

Three days before the march began, Bauer was summoned to headquarters to give information on routes. As there were no roads and the natives could not be trusted, his knowledge was valuable. He came back to barracks, after consuming a few drinks of palm-wine on the way, and came face to face with Lieutenant Friant, who perceived his condition and curtly ordered him to the guard-house.

Bauer, whom the heady palm-wine had turned into a perfect fiend, furiously tore open his cartridge-pouch, whipped a rifle from the rack, and fired point-blank at the lieutenant. The bullet missed Friant's cheek by an inch and slapped into the mud wall. Half a dozen of the Legion piled on to Bauer before he could fire again. They got him down, but he was foaming at the mouth, raving mad, and not until he was tied up could he be dragged off to the cells.

When he finally sobered up, he could remember nothing that had happened. His fate was perfectly clear, and he accepted it with sullen oaths; court-martial and execution....

The lieutenant, that evening, took his men aside and spoke with them, one by one— all who had witnessed the scene. Next morning came the court-martial. Bauer was brought in, surly, begrimed, with the look of a trapped animal. He mumbled a few inarticulate words and fell silent. For him, all was hopeless. Lieutenant Friant took the stand and spoke simply, clearly, quietly.

"The fault is really mine, for having issued loaded cartridges by mistake. They should have been blanks. In fact, Private Bauer must have supposed them blanks, as these were issued to all the men."

Surprise here, questioning of the other men; they all replied alike. Not, of course, that the officers trying the case were fooled by this talk of blank cartridges. They even eyed Friant and his Legionnaires with a certain cynical admiration, as though wishing him joy of his bargain.

And they were right. Bauer got off with a light sentence of cells and degradation; but far from expressing any gratitude, he cursed the lieutenant bitterly, with brutal and furious oaths, as soon as he could speak freely. And this won no love for him among his comrades.

The march began, and almost came to a sudden end at Dogba, when four thousand of Behanzin's picked troops struck the camp like a whirlwind at five in the morning. It was a complete surprise. The Amazons, strapping black women with huge sabers, led the attack. The camp was penetrated. For a moment all was lost. Commandant Faurax gathered the Legion, and fell dead. Raging, the Legion went into the blacks with the cold steel, met the Amazons hand to hand, cleared the camp of the enemy, and then attacked the four thousand. The black troops were shattered and disappeared in the brush.

Bauer fought like ten, that morning; and in the days of constant brush fighting that followed, bore himself well.

The advance was stubbornly contested. The enemy cut off the lines of communication and the supply service was disrupted. The marsh-lands along the river were horrible, the higher brush beyond was sun-smitten. Sickness began to make heavy inroads. The convoys bringing up water were attacked daily. Colonel Dodds reluctantly decided to return to Akpa, reorganize the column, evacuate the sick and wounded, firmly establish the service of supply, and then finish the job. Kana and the capital, Abomey, were not far now.

Behanzin, at this recoil of the column, imagined it in defeat, and his black troops harassed the line of march night and day. The Senegalese suffered most. As usual, they had their wives and families along; not to fight, but to prepare their food, help in carrying their loads, take care of them if ill or wounded, and so forth. These people suffered. So did the coolies who formed the transport. So did the Legion, for that matter, since food had run out. The horses disappeared. The splendid mules brought from Algeria, worth upward of a thousand francs there, did not survive long here; those not killed by the climate went into the pots of the Legion.

It was a terrific march under the sun of the equator. With Akpa almost at hand, the crisis came when, for lack of porters, the Senegalese tried to carry the litters of the sick and wounded. They crumpled up. The column was halted, with a spatter of rifle-fire along front and rear where the blacks were attacking. It was Bauer who, with a rolling volley of oaths, broke ranks and waved an arm at his comrades.

"Come along, come along!" he bawled furiously. "Let the Senegalese fight for a bit. The Legion's good for other things."

The others got his idea, advanced on the litters, and the astonished officers beheld the Legion doing coolie work for the sick and wounded, all the rest of the way into Akpa.

Oddly enough, in all this marching and fighting, as the food failed and sickness hit, Bauer kept up to the mark. It was observed that he always had lemons on hand, would trade anything for lemons. He had kept his knowledge to himself, which made the other men furious, but lemons not only kept one in health here, they also gave a grateful breath to the sick and wounded. The very odor was enough to make a feverish man smile gratefully.

So, if Bauer was blessed for one deed, he was cursed for another; and he gave back curse for curse like a snarling beast. No one was sorry when he disappeared.

It came just before they reached Akpa. A furious tornado hit the column; black clouds, terrific wind that kicked up a dust-storm until they struggled blindly; finally rain in sweeping torrents. And all the time the "pick-pock!" of rifles along the skirmish lines where the native troops fought off the harassing blacks. Private Bauer was pricked off on the list of missing.

FIGHTING GUSTY RAIN and wind that bent trees and almost carried a man from his feet, Bauer stumbled into a gully, was knocked senseless, and revived to find himself being hauled out by grinning black soldiers. He fought, and was rewarded by a long slave-yoke of wood fastened about his neck, nearly bending him double with its weight, whips stinging his legs to urge him on.

In this fashion, he finished the march; not to Akpa, but to Abomey— a city of mud walls where heads grinned on spikes, of thatched huts and huddled mud houses, of the mud and timber palace of King Behanzin, fronting on a great market-square.

When they took off the yoke, Bauer flew at the blacks around him, hoping to make them kill before they tortured. He fought with the insensate ferocity of a beast, caught a spear from the nearest man, killed three of them before a club knocked him over. Then he was bound, and with blood besmearing his face and beard, was led through the huge square to where the king waited, among his five hundred wives and his fearsome bodyguard of black Amazons.

A heavy black man wrapped in an old green silk dressing-gown, features wooden, cruel, impassive. A number of men were kneeling before him, an Amazon beside each one; these were leaders of his regiments whom the column had defeated. Behanzin lifted his hand. The sabers of the Amazons whirled, and the heads of the kneeling men dropped to the earth. The ground was blood-stained for yards around, from other executions.

Bauer was marched forward. Wiping the blood from his eyes, he saw the white-clad figure of a European among the group behind the king—a massive, heavily bearded man. This man spoke rapidly with the king, who gave a curt order. Instead of being handed over to the Amazon killers, Bauer found himself led away to a hut. Except for a chain that bound his ankle to the center-post of the hut, he was left free. Bowls of food were brought in. An Amazon stood guard at the door, and he was left in peace. Like the animal he was, he ate, washed the blood from his face, and fell asleep.

When he wakened, it was sunset, and a man sat smoking and watching him. It was the European he had seen behind the king.

Bauer sat up and blinked. The man was smoking a long native pipe whose bowl and stem were heavily and beautifully ornamented with worked silver. It caught the eye instantly.

"Ah!" exclaimed Bauer. "That's a pipe, a real one!"

"King Behanzin's pipe," said the visitor in German. "He gave it to me, as a mark of his favor. So you don't know me, Herman?"

Bauer's mouth fell open. His blue eyes widened. A low cry burst from him.

"You! No, no— not you, Hans! It cannot be— you're dead—"

The other smiled, leaned over to him, embraced him swiftly.

"So, brother Herman, I find you in the French army, the Legion! Yes, the last I heard from home, you had enlisted."

Bauer drew away. That touch of affection was more surprise than anything else; a remnant of boyhood, perhaps, when affection had existed.

"Ach!" he grunted, meeting the cold blue eyes, cold as his own. "And you, Hans! How is it that you're not dead? After your last letters came, there was word of your death."

"Politeness." Hans was of the same general build and air as his brother, had much the same voice. Without the beard, perhaps the two men would not have looked so much alike. The beard of Hans was a little more grizzled than the square-cut beard of Herman Bauer, but it was full, sweeping over his chest.

"Politeness to the family," he went on cynically. "I had an argument with my superior regarding a serious shortage in the funds of the trading-company. It came to blows. He got the worst of it, naturally, and I decamped. I was with an English company on the Niger for a year, then came over on my own to Dahomey. I did well. Officially, of course, I'm dead. Here I'm Hans Schmidt, trader, assistant to the king, counselor, what you like! I've handled a lot of deals for him, such as bringing in guns and powder and cartridges. If I ever get out of this country, I'll be well off. That's in some doubt, thanks to your damned French. How I'll get out, without my identity being learned, is a problem. And now you have to turn up to complicate matters!"

"Complicate matters?" repeated Bauer.

"Yes. The king wants your head to put over the gate. I got him to postpone taking it until tomorrow, so I could get information out of you in regard to the French column. But tomorrow—" And he shrugged as he resumed smoking.

Bauer stared, and gulped hard.

"Eh? But if you're in favor with him, you can have me held as a prisoner, exchanged, anything!"

"Nothing," said the other, with a terrible finality. "No prisoners in this war, my honest brother. Behanzin wants a white head above his gate, and means to have it. With it, he'll win the war— so the fetich priestesses have told him. He's already convinced that the column has retired, beaten."

"Bah! Merely to reorganize, get rid of the sick and wounded, and make a dash for Kana and this accursed place."

Hans nodded. "So I thought, myself. And I must get away before your French reach here; they'd hardly treat me with consideration. Luckily, I speak French perfectly, also English, and my money's safe out of the country—"

"My God!" said Bauer. "And that's all you think about, when I'm to die tomorrow?"

"Be sensible," the other said coolly. "You've been dead, to me, for a long time. We needn't prate about brotherly love. I'd help you if I can, but it's out of the question. Even if I got you away from this town, you'd never get ten miles without being run down. I hope your comrades in the Legion have more affection for you than the folks at home. Or are you still a mad dog?"

Bauer snarled in response, and Hans laughed a little.

"The same, eh?" he resumed lightly. "You've never redeemed yourself and the family name, and you never will. I would if I could; but you'd not. That's the difference between us, my brother."

"Yah!" jeered Bauer. "And you couldn't even if you would! You're officially dead at this minute!"

Hans chuckled amusedly. "Right; a good joke, too! However, I could clear out of here, go to Canada or America, and become a new man— simply because no one would ever be looking for me. I'd have money. I could go into business—"

"Why don't some of these blacks kill you?" snapped Bauer. "How can it be safe for you here, especially if Behanzin gets defeated by the whites?"

Hans held up the beautiful silver pipe.

"This— you see? The king's pipe is known everywhere; it's a sort of safeguard. No one would dare touch me, if I showed it."

"Then, why couldn't you let me take it and slip out of the damned place?"

Hans shook his head thoughtfully. "That has occurred to me; quite useless. Your escape would be discovered. Your charming guard is changed every three hours, and in three hours you'd not get far. In fact, if I save you from torture, I'll be doing all in my power."

He was quite calm about it, quite definite. Beneath his impassive mien, however, was an equally definite stirring of anxiety, even emotion. Bauer divined this, and suddenly comprehended. If any earthly thing could be done to save him, his brother would do it; there simply was nothing. Next moment, this was proven.

"A message to Akpa?" he suggested. "If the French knew any white prisoners had been taken, they might—"

Hans shook his massive beard. "I sent off word this morning," he said quietly. "My messenger was turned back."

Bauer drew a deep breath and nodded.

"I see. Well, brother, I thank you; I understand.... Shall I see you again?"

Hans nodded.

"In the morning, yes. It won't be until noon; we'll have until then. Meantime, I'll try everything in my power. I've tried everything except threats—it isn't healthy to try threats with Behanzin. But I'll try them. Are more troops coming up to join your force, do you know?"

"A detachment of marines, yes."

"Good. Perhaps I can make the fool see reason. You know," he added gravely, "this king is what we, at home, would call a monster. He thrives on blood. Auf wiedersehen!"

Bauer found himself alone again. His eyes followed the square-shouldered figure, with the silver pipe in its hand.

Noon tomorrow, then. And now the evening was at hand. He remembered how the Amazons had lopped off those heads, each at one swift, sure stroke. He fumbled in his pocket for tobacco, and rolled a cigarette. His few belongings remained intact, for he had nothing that attracted black cupidity. He smoked thoughtfully, calmly. After all, no man could have a quicker, cleaner death—if only there were no torture!

When Hans, the following morning, came stooping into the hut and straightened up, the attitude of the two men was just the opposite of what it had been the previous day. Now it was the khaki-clad Bauer who was impassive, phlegmatic, absolutely cool; now it was the white-clad Hans who was nervous, agitated, his eyes bloodshot, his fingers unsteady as they clasped the silver pipe. At sight of the pipe, the Amazon on guard had admitted him at once.

"I've just been with Behanzin," he burst out. "There was a scene— a hell of a scene! He damned near had his women slice me on the spot! I used threats. I told him the French were being reinforced. The fat fool's been drinking. He's just killed twenty native prisoners, a couple of your Senegalese in the group. He's sending for you in ten minutes. Ach, Gott! It's frightful. I'm helpless—"

"Forget it, brother," Bauer said quietly, and smiled. "There's something you can do for me, if you will; change clothes with me. Then put on your white coat again, so you won't be in French uniform."

Hans stared at him. "Eh? Why?"

"I should like to die in clean garments, brother. It's a fancy of mine."

Hans obeyed, with tears glittering on his beard. He donned the army boots, the torn khaki trousers and shirt. His hand struck something in the shirt pocket.

"What's this?"

"My papers. Keep them." Bauer lit his last cigarette. "Now do something else for me."

"Anything. My God, if there's anything—"

"You'll do it? Give me your word of honor, brother."

"Of course!" said Hans in a shaken voice. "What, then?"

Bauer smiled. "Calm yourself. You want to get out of this country; well, I'm showing you the way. Cut your beard square, like mine— you see? You have the clothes, the papers. You have the silver pipe which will get you safe away from here. Go back and join the Legion in my name— say that the blacks captured you, but you got away—"

"Herman! You're insane!"

"Quite the contrary. Half the Legion speaks French with an accent or speaks it very poorly. You've been a soldier. No one would question you for a moment. I've got a bad record; well, turn it into a good record, Hans! You couldn't manage it under different circumstances, perhaps, but here, on campaign, it'll go off like clockwork. Shave your beard entirely, if you like, later on. I've always worn a beard in the Legion—"

A tramp of feet. A dozen of the Amazons were marching up. He rose, calmly, and put out his hand.

"They're here. Good-by, brother! Oh, I forgot to tell you— so many things—"

They gave him no time to tell anything. The two men, embracing, were roughly jerked apart. Hans fell with his face in his hands, sobbing. Bauer marched out proudly and calmly, and everything was drowned in the yelling voices of the thousands of black folk thronged in the great square before the palace.

Next time Hans saw the face of his brother, it was on a spike above the palace gate. It speaks well for him, perhaps, that he risked a great deal to get that head down, and took it with him when he went by night, and buried it.

Some days later, Bauer came staggering into camp. The column was advancing from Akpa; he was picked up muttering in fever, and his appearance was regarded as miraculous. His story was disjointed, incoherent, but he had suffered much. And he had learned a great deal about the army of King Behanzin, about the fortifications at Kana, about everything the superior command most needed to know.

True, he had forgotten a great deal about things closer to hand. When he met Lieutenant Friant, the young officer halted and held out his hand.

"I'm glad you got back, Bauer," he said frankly, curiously. "Congratulations!"

"Thank you, Lieutenant," said Bauer awkwardly, but with a friendly glow in his blue eyes. "Thank you! It is like coming back from the dead."

The officer looked after him curiously. Assuredly, the fellow had changed!

Others found it so, too. In little ways, on the march, he just didn't know his way around; he was awkward, fumbling, uncertain. He seemed to have forgotten many things. All this was natural, with the touch of fever that was on him. The remarkable point was the difference in the man himself. All the old snarling animal had disappeared. Bauer was a man now, human. Doubtfully, hesitantly, some of his comrades began to like him a little....

THEY PLUNGED directly into brush fighting. The column hammered straight on for Kana, the holy city of Dahomey. This was defended with desperate courage; the battle lasted three whole days, but the French were fully informed of the intrenchments, the disposition of Behanzin's army, and the terrain ahead. The hand-to-hand fighting was severe. The Amazons died with ferocity, but they died.

Bauer got his ticket home—a bullet tearing through his chest, that landed him in a litter. As the wounded waited for the convoy to start back with them, Lieutenant Friant came staggering along, escorted by two men. An access of fever shook him. He was pale and flushed by turns, and halted, unable to go another step, while his men went to search for a litter.

"Ha, my lieutenant!" said Bauer. "Here's something that'll do you good."

Painfully, he twisted about, got a hand to the musette under his head, and drew out a lemon. The officer seized it with a gasp of gratitude, then checked himself.

"No, no! You need it more than I do, Bauer."

"Bah!" Private Bauer laughed a little, his white teeth flashing through that square, bushy beard of his. "I detest lemons, my lieutenant!"

And Friant bit into the yellow fruit with a sigh, as he sank down on the litter provided for him. He died three days later....

Bauer? Oh, he was tough! He got sent back to the base, and on to Porto Novo, and his wound healed in time. He had not even lost his pipe— a long pipe of beautifully worked silver about the wooden bowl and stem. One of the officers, recognizing it as native work, offered him a large sum for it, but Bauer only laughed.

"Pardon, but I can never part with this pipe! It is more than money to me. Where would I get another like it?"

"Where, indeed!" sighed the officer regretfully. "However, Bauer, when you get back to Algeria and your wife has a woman's say about that pipe— my offer stands good!"

This was Bauer's first intimation that a wife awaited him in Algeria.

AND THERE, to the general surprise of everyone, Wetzler ended his story abruptly. Voices poured at him to continue, demanding to know one thing and another. He held up his hand, with a shrug.

"Comrades! You say the Dahomey campaign was a parade, eh? Well, let me tell you something. We came back to Oran, and before we had reached the Zouave barracks where the Dames de France had arranged a feast for us, we began to go to hospital. It's the truth! Not one of us was the same man. For weeks afterward, the men of the Legion were taken off to hospital—"

Corrigan lifted a lusty voice.

"Devil take your hospitals! What we want to know is what became of Bauer? And the wife of his brother?"

Wetzler shook his head. "I don't know. At the end of his enlistment he left the service. I imagine he married the wife who was waiting for him— surely, a woman would know the truth! Well, that's all."

It was disappointing. We had expected some grand climax, and there was none to the story....

When the party broke up, Corrigan drove home with me.

"If you're so damned interested in what happened to Bauer," he said to me, "why don't you ask Wetzler yourself? There's no doubt the old rascal knows, but he simply won't tell. He has a tailor-shop out on the west side of town somewhere— look it up in the telephone-book. Herman H. Wetzler is the name."

Well, I looked it up, found the address, and drove out there. I was curious enough to put the question to him.

I had to park at some little distance from his tailor shop, which was a small but comfortable-looking establishment. So I left the car and walked along to the shop, and paused to look in the window.

What a lucky pause that was! Inside, showing samples to a client, I saw Wetzler's spare, trim figure. A gray-haired woman came from the back room with some question. He turned to her, smiled, kissed her cheek affectionately, and came back to his client. And as he did so, I saw that he held a pipe in his hand— a long-stemmed pipe, of queer design, stem and bowl covered over with silverwork of curious form.

As I looked at it, the truth flashed upon me. This was the pipe of King Behanzin, of course!

So I went away without asking any question. I knew the answer already.

___________________________

2: "To Every one His Own Fear"

L. T. Meade and Dr Clifford Halifax M.D.

Strand Magazine, Dec 1895

AMONGST his friends Charlie Fane's name was always spoken of as a synonym of good luck. I happened to meet this gay and debonnaire youth during a short visit which I paid to my friends, the Cullinghams, at their beautiful place in Warwickshire. The time of year was towards Christmas, and there was a merry house party at "The Chase." The old house rang with mirth and festivity from morning till night. The spirit of the time seemed to get into the rooms, and to infect us all to a more or less degree. Even the elderly amongst us yielded, to the all-prevailing spirit of frolic, and forgot for a time, in the most pleasurable manner in the world, the graver side of life. There were several young men in the house, but Fane was the life of the party. His spirits ran the highest, his wit was the most appreciated, his songs were invariably encored, and his society sought for, not only amongst the girls, but also the men of the party. All alike petted and feted him— in short, his presence was looked upon as sunshine, and his praise was on everyone's lips.

Cullingham, my host, was a grave, middle-aged man on the shady side of fifty. Mrs. Cullingham was a charming hostess, possessing, I think, only one failing, and that was an incessant and almost tiresome habit of praising the hero of the hour— Charlie Fane. It is irksome to hear even the best person always vaunted to the skies, but I must say that Charlie took the good things which were said about him without the least approach to conceit or self-consciousness. Fortune had always smiled upon him, and he believed it would do so to the end. He was in high favour when I arrived at "The Chase," but before my brief visit terminated, he was more than ever the cynosure of all eyes.

Amongst the guests was a very beautiful girl, of the name of Alice Lefroy. Charlie's susceptible heart was immediately smitten with her charms; he followed her about like a shadow, and it was more than evident to all present that Miss Lefroy was not unwilling to receive attentions from him. The happy youth made love in the most open and undisguised style, having little doubt that, according to his invariable good luck, he would obtain without much difficulty the object of his desire. On the evening before I left "The Chase" to return to my London duties, I spent an hour or two with Cullingham in his smoking-room.

"By the way," I said, as I rose to say good-night, "you will let me know how affairs progress between Fane and Miss Lefroy. I am interested in them— in short, they look like a couple who have come straight from Eden, and have never had anything to do with the bad ways of this troublesome world."

Cullingham laughed in a rather strained manner when I spoke. He was silent for a moment, looking thoughtful.

"It isn't my affair, of course," he said, after a long pause; " but, nevertheless, I am not thoroughly happy about this business. Fane is one of the most attractive fellows I have ever come across."

"If he is attractive to Miss Lefroy that is all right," I replied. " She evidently likes him— I do not think either of the young folks have taken much trouble to disguise their feelings."

"That is just it," said my host, " that is just what bothers me; Fane is in love with Alice, and I greatly fear that Alice is in love with him. Now it happens that she is engaged to another man."

"Impossible!" I said.

"It is only too true," said Cullingham; "she has been engaged for the last couple of years to a man considerably her senior, of the name of Pennington. Philip Pennington is sincerely attached to her, and until now I considered ihe engagement a very happy one. When first she came, I regarded the little flirtation between her and Fane as nothing more than a joke, but now I begin to doubt whether I did wisely in not telling him of her engagement."

"I know Miss Lefroy very slightly," I said; "but the little I have seen of her makes me doubt whether it would be possible for so sweet and frank a girl to act with duplicity— she has doubtless mentioned her engagement to Fane. Well, I am sorry. I did hope that couple would have made a match of it— they seemed so pre-eminently suited to each other."

"So they are, Halifax," said Cullingham. "I feel as sorry as you do at the present moment about the affair. I sincerely hope it is not serious, and will say something to Fane to-morrow."

Soon afterwards I bade my host "goodnight," and retired to my own room.

The hour was late, but I was not at all inclined for slumber. I sat down, therefore, by my cheerful fire, and taking up a book tried to engross myself in its contents. To my surprise— for I am a voracious reader— I found I could not do so. Between me and the open page appeared, with tiresome reiteration, the face and figure of Fane— the clear eyes; the straight, well-cut features; the broad, athletic figure; the muscular hands; the splendid physique of the man. By his side I saw also the ethereal and exquisitely proportioned face and form of the fair young girl whom, after all, he might never hope to win.

"There comes a day when the luckiest man finds his luck forsake him— it is the course of life," I could not help muttering to myself. As this reflection came to me, I started suddenly to my feet: a sharp and somewhat imperative knock had come to my bedroom door.

I went quickly across the room and opened the door. Fane stood without.

"I hope you won't find me an awful nuisance," he said, "but I saw a light under your door— can you spare me five minutes of your time?"

It is my luck to find myself appealed to in an emergency. This young man had never made a special friend of me up to this moment. One glance at his face, however, was sufficient to show that he meant to confide in me now. I was glad of it, for I had taken a great liking for him.

"Wait a moment," I said, " until I get into my coat; there is a fire still in the smoking-room— we can go down there."

"Yes, we can have the smoking-room to ourselves," said Fane, "for every other soul in the house is in bed."

"Go down, then, and wait for me," I said. " I will join you in a moment."

I did so. When I entered the smoking-room, Fane was standing with his back to the fire, which he had built up into a glowing and compact mass— he had also turned on the electric light, and the room looked cheerful.

"Now, what can I do for you?" I said, dropping into a chair and looking up at him.

"Confound it!" he muttered. He gnawed his moustache almost savagely, and looked down at me without adding to this exclamation. I waited for him to go on.

"It is awfully hard lines to worry you," he said; "but Alice and I―"

"Alice?" I interrupted.

"Oh, Miss Lefroy I mean— hang it all, you may as well know the truth— Miss Lefroy and I are engaged. Hear me out, please."

I was preparing to interrupt him, but sank back now in my chair and allowed him to finish his story.

"We are engaged," he said— his tone had a certain defiance in it— " t came about to-night, unexpectedly; I am coming to particulars in a moment or two. We are in trouble, I daresay you guess; but our engagement is hard and binding, thank Heaven! Alice thought we had best confide in you— it is a shame, of course, for you are not even a special friend— but she shrank from Cullingham or Mrs. Cullingham knowing anything about it, and you are a doctor, and a good fellow, people say; may I go on?"

"You certainly may," I answered.

"Ah, thanks. You see, Alice guessed all right about you— I won't tell you all she said, it would make you conceited— but, there, I wish you could have seen her face when she said, ' Thank God, Dr. Halifax is in the house.' "

"Well, tell me your story now, my dear fellow," I interrupted.

"Alice is engaged to me— that is the main thing— that is the rock to which I cling."

"But how can that be?" I said. "It is scarcely an hour ago since Cullingham informed me that Miss Lefroy was engaged to a man of the name of Philip Pennington."

"Pennington is in the house," said Charlie, clenching his hand. " He arrived at Ashworth by the last train, and drove over in a fly— it was that hurried matters on. Alice wants to break with him, doctor— she never loved him— why, he is twenty years her senior. I vow before Heaven I won't give her up— now, what is to be done?"

"It is an ugly business," I said. "I don't know that I ought to help you — you had no right to steal Pennington's promised bride from him."

"You mustn't blame Alice," he began, eagerly. "She told me of her engagement the first day I saw her, and showed me her ring; we played at love at first, and never knew that it was going to be reality until we found ourselves deep in the fire. Alice and I often sat and talked by the hour of Pennington; we saw no danger, and knew of none until tonight when she heard his voice in the hall— she and I were together in the conservatory. She turned like a sheet, and I, well, I broke down then; I had her in my arms in a minute, and, of course, after that, it was all up; but, hang it, Pennington thinks she is still engaged to him, and what is to be done? The thing must be broken off— it is a horrid business for her and for me, and for Pennington too, poor beggar ! Now I think of it, I can almost pity him for having lost her."

"You want my advice?" I said, abruptly. " Well, yes— that is, Alice thought— the fact is, we must consult someone, and you are in the house."

"I will tell you what I should do if I were you," I said.

"Yes?"

Fane remained standing— his good-humoured, happy face looked quite haggard — there were heavy lines round his mouth— he was as white as death.

"I should be man enough," I said, looking him full in the face as I spoke, " to leave this house by the first train in the morning in order to give Miss Lefroy a fair chance of reconsidering the position."

Fane opened his lips to interrupt me, but I went on, doggedly. " That is the right thing to do," I said; "go away at once. Give Miss Lefroy three months— you took her by surprise— let her know her own mind when you are not present to influence her. The fact is this, Fane, you must endeavour to look at things from Pennington's point of view— you must put yourself, in short, in his place. How would you feel if, during your absence, another man tried to alienate the affections of the girl you were engaged to? Remember, the fact of the engagement was never concealed from you."

"I know— I am a scoundrel," said Fane.

He turned his back abruptly, leant his elbow on the mantel-piece, and covered his face with his hands.

"You have done what many another hot-headed young fellow has done before you," I continued. " Up to the present your conduct has been excusable, but the test of your manhood will depend upon how you act now."

"I know," he said, turning fiercely round and looking at me; "but I can't do it, sir— before Heaven, I can't!"

"Then I have nothing more to say," I remarked, rising as I spoke. "I am sorry for you and sorry for Pennington. Goodnight."

I held out my hand as I spoke; he grasped it silently— his eyes would not meet mine. I left him and went back to my room.

I had to return to town by the first train in the morning, and did not think it likely that I should see Fane again. Cullingham saw me off. He informed me briefly that Philip Pennington had arrived unexpectedly by the last train the night before. I had scarcely any remark to make to this, for I could not betray young Fane's confidence, but I begged of Cullingham to let me know the issue of events.

"There'll be the mischief to pay," he said, gloomily. " At the present moment neither Alice Lefroy nor Fane know of Pennington's arrival; of course, the fat will be in the fire now. Well, I will write to you, Halifax, when I have anything to say."

A moment later I was bowling away in the dog-cart which was to convey me to the station. My train left Ashworth at eight o'clock, and I had just ensconced myself comfortably in the corner of a first-class compartment, when a porter hastily opened the door and admitted a young lady. She threw up her veil the moment she saw me, and taking the seat opposite mine, bent forward impulsively.

"I thought you would be going to town by this train, and hoped I might have your company to London," she said. "You don't mind, do you? "

"I am surprised to see you, Miss Lefroy," I answered.

"But you are not angry with me, Dr. Halifax?" she said. " Charlie told me of your interview with him last night. Under the circumstances, I could not meet Mr. Pennington, so I thought it best to go— Charlie will see him after breakfast and tell him everything."

She panted slightly as she spoke; she was a very fragile, beautiful girl. At the first glance one would suppose that she scarcely possessed the physique which would stand much shock; but as I observed her more closely I came to the conclusion that she was possessed of a considerable amount of tenacity of purpose, and might, on occasion, be obstinate, in a cause which she took to heart. It was not my place to find fault with her; I therefore saw that she had a foot-warmer, helped her to unfasten her rug from its strap, and, when the train was in motion, asked her how she contrived to get away without Cullingham's knowledge.

"Oh, I sneaked off," she said, with a little laugh; "my maid helped me. I left a note for Mrs. Cullingham, and we drove away by the back avenue. We saw your trap ahead of us most of the way. My maid is in a second-class compartment next to this. If you really wish it, I can join her at the next station."

"By no means," I answered; "I shall be glad to have your company up to town."

I unfolded a newspaper as I spoke, and for a short time engrossed myself in its contents. Looking up presently, I observed that Miss Lefroy was gazing fixedly out of the window, and that her pretty soft eyes were full of tears.

"Well," I said, laying down my paper, "I suppose you want to tell me your story?"

"Oh, no; I don't wish to say much," she answered, in a steady, grave voice— " there is not much to tell. My mind is absolutely made up. I shall marry Mr. Fane— if I do not marry him I will never marry anybody. It is quite true that for the last couple of years I have been engaged to Philip Pennington, but I never loved him. I am an orphan, and have no money, and Philip is rich— enormously rich; and my aunt, Mrs. Leslie— she lives in London— I am going to her now— urged and urged the marriage— so I consented to be engaged, but I did not love him. That fact did not matter, perhaps, until the moment came when I learned to love another man. You must know for yourself that under existing circumstances it would be a sin for me to marry Philip Pennington."

" That is the case," I replied, after a pause. " I am sincerely sorry for you. May I ask what you intend to do when you get to town ?'"

"I shall tell Aunt Fanny the truth, and will then immediately write to Philip— but he will have heard the story before then."

"Do you mind telling me what sort of a man he is?"

She looked distressed. "People think a good deal of him," she said, after a pause; " but I— I have never really trusted him. Oh, it seems a dreadful thing to say of the man you expected at one time to marry, but he looks to me— sinister— there, don't ask me any more— it is wrong of me to have said even what I did."

She turned her head aside again, and drawing down her veil sank back in her seat.

At the next station some other passengers got into the compartment, and I had not an opportunity of making any further inquiries. At Paddington I saw Miss Lefroy into a cab, and as I said " Good-bye," told her that if at any time I could be of service to her she had but to command me. I then returned to Harley Street to attend to my many and pressing duties.

A week passed before I heard anything of Fane or Miss Lefroy; then one morning a letter arrived from Cullingham— it was satisfactory, as far as it went.

"You will be anxious to hear full particulars with regard to what I am pleased to call Fane's entanglement," said Cullingham, after he had prefaced his letter with remarks of general interest. "By the way, I believe that little goose Alice travelled up to London in the same train with you. Imagine her sneaking off in that fashion! However, now to particulars. I think I gave you to understand that I always had a high respect for Pennington, which I am sure you will share when I tell you how well he has behaved in this matter. On the morning you left, Fane had an interview with me. He spoke in a very manly way, poor lad, and told me everything. I saw that the case was a serious one, and that neither of the pair was really much to blame. Fane begged of me to break the news to Pennington, who was already, I could see, very much annoyed by Alice's unexpected departure. I had a bad quarter of an hour when I told my old friend how matters really stood. The tidings were scarcely pleasant ones, but there was no help for it— I could not mince matters. Pennington's fiancee had given her heart to another man. That being the case, I assured him that his own engagement could not possibly go on. I confess that he looked ugly for a time, and refused to see Fane at all. But he recovered himself in the most surprising manner, and told me on the following morning that he withdrew from his position as Miss Lefroy's lover, and would do what he could for the young couple. This was more than could have been expected of him, and I told him what I thought of his generosity. He went up to town that day and saw Alice; her aunt, Mrs. Leslie, wrote to say no one could have behaved better than Pennington. She said she felt very angry with Alice, who shrank from the poor fellow with ill-concealed dislike. He took no notice of this, but spoke to her in the most affectionate way.

" 'I see, child,' he said, 'that I cannot be your husband; but, as I am sincerely attached to you'— here his voice quite shook— 'I am willing and anxious now to act the part of a father. I will do all in my power for you and Fane, and you must both arrange to pay me, as soon as possible, a long visit at Birstdale Abbey, my place in Roxburgh.'

"This arrangement was made on the spot, although Miss Lefroy began by objecting to it very strongly. Pennington and Mrs. Leslie, however, over-ruled all objections. Pennington is to have a large house party in February, and Mrs. Leslie, Alice, and Fane are to be amongst the most favoured guests. Fane is poor, and Alice has no fortune, so the young couple must not think of matrimony for some little time.

"Yours truly,

"John Cullingham."

I had scarcely read this letter before my servant threw open the door to admit a visitor. I was sitting in my breakfast-room at the time; I raised my eyes to see who my guest was, and then rose up with a smile to see and congratulate Charlie Fane.

"I wonder if you have heard the news?" he said.

"I am just reading about it," I said, pointing to Cullingham's letter as I spoke. "Sit down, won't you? May I give you some breakfast?"

"No, thanks; I have had some at my club. Well, I am the luckiest fellow in the world."

"You have my best wishes," I answered. "You had a generous foe, Fane; few men, under the circumstances, would have acted as Pennington has done."

"So everyone says," replied Fane.

He sank down on a seat and, resting his elbow on his knee, pressed his hand to his cheek-— his eyes sought the floor. He had just won the girl of his choice, but he scarcely looked like a rapturous or happy lover at that moment.

"What's up now?" I could not help muttering to myself.

The thought had scarcely rushed through my brain before Fane fixed his eyes on my face.

"You are surprised to find me in the blues," he said. "Of course it goes without saying that I am the luckiest dog in Christendom. I am madly in love with Alice, and she with me, bless her. As to our engagement being a long one, we both of us are prepared to face that. Pennington has been good― well, to tell the truth, I wish he had been worse— it is horrible to take favours from a fellow whom you have just robbed of his dearest possession. The fact is, doctor, Alice and I hate beyond words the idea of going to Birstdale Abbey.

"Pennington's kindness in the matter is almost overpowering; he has not only taken Alice completely under his wing, by regarding her now, as he says, in the light of a dearly loved daughter, but he has done the same for me. He talks to me by the hour about my prospects, and assures me that he will not leave a stone unturned to further my interests. Nevertheless, ungrateful as it is of me to say the thing, I can't abide him. The thought of going to stay at his place is most repugnant to me— Alice shares my antipathy to the whole arrangement."

"I can quite understand your feelings," I replied; "were I in your place I should be similarly affected; but may I ask why you go?"

"I cannot get out of it— nor can Alice. Pennington wrung a promise from her when he went to release her from her engagement to him. At such a moment she was not in a position to refuse him anything in reason that he asked. Mrs. Leslie, Alice's aunt, is most anxious that we should keep on friendly terms with Pennington. She is to accompany us to the Abbey — we go on Monday. I assure you, sir, I by no means look forward with pleasure to the visit."

"Well, after all, it is a trifle," I said, rising as I spoke, "and as you yourself admit, you owe a great deal to Mr. Pennington for behaving so well."

"I should think I do. The fact is, I'm a brute for not worshipping him; but he has done far more than I have told you. I am a good linguist, and he believes that he can give me substantial help in that direction. Pennington's brother is in the Embassy, and Pennington is trying to get me a post as his secretary. Of course, that would mean foreign service, and parting from Alice for a time, but would eventually lead to our marriage. Yes, the man has behaved like a brick; nevertheless, I loathe the idea of staying at his place."

"l am afraid you must grin and bear it," I said.

"Yes, of course."

Here Fane paused— he raised his eyes and looked full at me. "It is a sin to waste your time with this sort of grumble," he said. "You don't suppose I have come here this morning just to whine about such a small matter. The fact is, I want to consult you on something else. Will you please regard my visit as professional?"

"You are surely not in bad health?" I asked, looking in astonishment at the splendid, athletic-looking youth.

"Not really, but I sometimes fancy that I have something wrong with my heart. When a man contemplates marriage he ought to be certain that he is sound in every point. Will you examine my heart, doctor?"

"Certainly, if you wish it."

I rose as I spoke, fetched my stethoscope, and soon had the satisfaction of telling Fane that he must not give way to nervous fancies, for his heart was perfectly sound in every particular. I thought my words would reassure him, but his face still looked pale, his eyes were full of gloom, and the haggard lines which I had noticed about his jovial, good-humoured face when he first told me of his engagement to Miss Lefroy again manifested themselves.

"I cannot get over it," he said. " I must confide in you. Do you know that once, as a boy, I was supposed to be dead?"

"You had an attack of catalepsy?" I asked.

"You would perhaps call it by that name — anyhow, it was a sort of trance. May I tell you the story?"

"Take a seat, Fane. I am much interested in this subject, and would be glad to listen to any information you can give me."

"You believe that death can sometimes be assumed?"

"I know it for a fact," I answered.

"I am glad to hear you say so— I have asked that question of more than one doctor, and in almost every case have received a smile of derision."

"These assumed deaths are not so common as some nervous people imagine," I continued, " but I firmly believe that there are cases on record where persons have been buried alive. This would be more likely to occur in foreign countries, where interment, as a rule, takes place on the day of the death. There is only one remedy for such a state of things— but that, perhaps, is too professional to interest you."

"Not at all— I am morbidly interested in this subject, as you will know when I tell you my own experience."

"The law, as it at present stands, is not sufficiently strict with regard to the death certificate," I said. "No doctor ought to give a certificate of death, under any circumstances whatever, without having viewed the body. As the law now stands, if for any reason it is inconvenient for the doctor to be present after death, he has only to put in the words: 'As I am informed.' Apart from any danger of burial alive, which is, of course, very slight, the present arrangement leaves a loophole for crime. The law should be altered on this point without delay."

"I am heartily glad that those are your views," answered Fane. " I only wish that every doctor in the land could hear you. Now then, I will tell you my own story. My mother died when I was eighteen— she died suddenly of failure of the heart. I was her only son— we were passionately attached to each other. I left her quite well on a certain morning, and came back after a day's fishing to find her no more. The news came on me as a sudden and awful blow. I succumbed to it immediately and became very ill. I don't remember how I felt, nor exactly from what I suffered, but I lay in bed, refusing food, and with a dull weight of indifference which possessed me more and more strongly day after day. My nurse and attendants were, I feel convinced, under the impression that I was quite unconscious, but the strange and terrible thing is, that this was never the case. I heard the faintest whisper which was breathed in the room in which I lay— I understood with almost preternatural clearness everything that went on. I knew when the doctor visited me, and when the nurse moved about by my bedside, and when my mother's old servant bent over me and sobbed. There came a day when I heard the doctor say :—

" 'The case is hopeless— he is dying— nothing more can be done for him. There is no use worrying him with medicines. He will pass away quietly within the next hour or two. Let me know when he dies; I will send you down a certificate.'

"The doctor was an old man— he had attended my mother for years. After pronouncing my death-warrant, I heard him leave the room. I lay motionless on my back with my eyes tightly shut— the weight which pressed me down grew heavier and heavier. The nurse lingered for a time in the room. I knew she bent over me— I felt her breath on my cheek— there was a slight warmth and an impression of added light, and I think she was moving a candle before my eyes. I think also that she placed a glass over my lips to see if there were any breath; after a time she left me. I was alone. I felt myself incapable of moving an eyelid— I was bound tightly as if in solid iron. After a long time— it seemed almost like eternity to me— I heard the door open again, and a brisk young step came over the threshold.

" 'You say he died half an hour ago, Mrs. Manning? ' said a voice, which I recognised as belonging to another doctor of the same firm.

" 'Yes, sir, about half an hour ago,' was the reply.

" A stab of horror went through my heart. I made a frantic effort to move, but could not stir. The invisible irons bound me down more tightly than ever.

" 'Well, as I am here, I will have a look at him,' said the doctor.

"He approached the bedside, raised my eyelids— I could see him, though I could not stir— and looked into my eyes. I watched him through an awful film— he felt for my pulse, and finally applied his stethoscope to my heart. There was a long pause, and then I heard him say the following blessed words:—

" 'I don't believe he is dead— there are still sounds of the heart's action, though faint.'

"How I blessed that doctor— his words lifted me from torment to Heaven. He took my hand and suddenly raised my arm into the air— it remained in the position where he had placed it. He again pressed it down, and it fell.

" 'This is a case of catalepsy,' he said. 'There can be no certificate of death given at present. Keep the room warm, and at intervals introduce a little nourishment into the mouth by means of a feather. I will come and see the patient again to-morrow.'

"I was told afterwards that I lay in this state for two or three days, and was finally restored to animation by means of electricity. After this had been applied several times, I sat up and opened my eyes.

"Now, sir," continued Fane, taking his handkerchief from his pocket and wiping the moisture from his forehead as he spoke, "but for the fact of the other doctor coming in on the chance to inquire how I was, I might— indeed, I may add, I should— have been buried alive."

"Your story is full of interest," I said, "but it has upset you, and the tale is, undoubtedly, a gruesome one. I have listened to it with attention, and find that it confirms my own theory to the letter. Now let us turn to more cheerful topics."

"I cannot do so, doctor. I have told you this story with a reason. You may laugh at me or not, but you have got to hear me out."

"I shall certainly not laugh at you," I answered. "Tell me all that is in your mind."

"I was eighteen when I ran that narrow shave of being buried alive," said Fane; "I am now twenty-eight. Ten years have gone by since that terrible date. When you first saw me at 'The Chase,' what did you think of me, Dr. Halifax?"

"That you were the jolliest, most thoughtless, and happiest youth of my acquaintance," I replied.

He smiled faintly.

"I always take people in," he said. "Over and over, I have been assured that I personate the happy boy to perfection. Now listen. I am not a boy, I am a man— a man, haunted ever with a terrible and inexpressible dread."

" What is that?" I asked.

"That I shall once again fall into a trance and be really buried alive."

"Oh, come, you talk nonsense," I said, rising as I spoke. "Your nerves are not as strong as they ought to be. I scarcely like to tell you that you ought to be ashamed of yourself, but seeing that you are in perfect health, and are young, and just engaged to the girl you love, it seems to me to be your manifest duty to cast off these dismal imaginings."

"It may be my duty, but, all the same, I cannot do it," he replied, doggedly. "Let me tell you something, sir. It was never your lot to lie as I did in what seemed an iron cage, and to hear your death pronounced when the part of you that felt and suffered was alive and full of vigour. What my tortured spirit underwent during those few hours of that one day I have no words to express. Heavens ! I recall the horror now. Scarcely a night passes that the memory of it does not come back to me. There are times when the thought of it, and the inexpressible fear that it may return, almost drive me mad. Just now I am in the full throes of the agony. There are moments when I feel completely overpowered with a premonition of a coming catastrophe— such is my feeling with regard to this visit to Birstdale Abbey. I am convinced that I shall have a cataleptic seizure while there. Now, I know that from a common-sense point of view this is all nonsense; but the fact is, there is not a man living who can reason me out of my conviction."

His hands shook— his troubled eyes sought the ground. Suddenly he looked up at me.

"I believe you pity me?" he said.

"From my heart I do."

"Then will you make me a promise?" he asked, with great eagerness.

"I will do anything in my power to

reassure and comfort you."

" If at any time the news of my death should reach you, will you personally ascertain beyond doubt that death has actually occurred?"

"You may be far away from me when you die," I answered. "Remember you are many years my junior. I hope it will be your fate to follow, not precede me, into the Land of Shades."

"If you die first, there is nothing more to be said," he replied; "but if you are alive, and if I am anywhere in the British Isles, will you make me a promise that I shall not be buried without your verifying my death?"

I looked him full in the eyes.

"I will," I answered.

He shivered, and tears of actual relief sprang to his eyes. I laid one of my hands on his broad shoulder.

"Listen to me, Fane. In a case of this kind two words are enough. You have my promise. Now rest happy and turn your thoughts to healthier subjects."

"I will do so— thank you— God bless you!"

He took up his hat and a moment or two later he left me.

A fortnight afterwards I received a letter from him. It was dated from Birstdale Abbey, and was written in a very cheerful and happy vein. He assured me that Pennington made a delightful host— that Alice and he were enjoying themselves to their hearts' content— that the weather was crisp and fine, and that his own health was much better.

"Pennington is a good fellow," he said, in conclusion. "I am almost certain to get that foreign post. If such is the case, our marriage need not be deferred more than a couple of years— Alice is only eighteen now, and she will not at all mind waiting. Fennington quite acts like a father to her, and she assures me that she likes him far better in that capacity than in that of a lover. We are likely to stay here for another month. If you will allow me, I will call to see you when I return to London.

Yours sincerely,

Charlie Fane."

There was a P.S. to the letter, which ran as follows :—

"I have not forgotten your promise, doctor— it lifts an enormous weight from my mind."

I received this letter at breakfast time, but had not time to read it until I was going my rounds in the afternoon. I was pleased to learn that things were going well with the young pair, and also that Fane was overcoming the morbid distress which if indulged in might destroy the peace of his life. It was on the evening of that same day that my servant brought in an evening paper, and laid it as usual on my writing-table. J took it up, and opening it at random, my eyes fell on the following words :—

Sad Accident from Drowning.

Mr. Charles Fane, a young man of about twenty- eight years of age, met his death in a tragic manner on Tuesday night on Loch Ardtry. The weather was exceptionally fine, and the young gentleman went out duck-shooting by moonlight. His boat evidently sprang a leak, and must have filled with water when in the middle of the lake. The unfortunate man started to swim for the shore, but the exertion and shock must have caused failure of the heart's action, for he was discovered early on Wednesday morning clinging to some water-weeds with his head well out of the water, but quite dead. The melancholy occurrence has caused the deepest grief at Birstdale Abbey, the country seat of Philip Pennington, Esq., where Mr. Fane was staying.

I read the paragraph with horror— the paper fell from my hands. In the room in which I now sat, Fane had talked to me less than three weeks ago, telling me of his premonition of a coming catastrophe. I had naturally thought nothing of his fears. Poor youth ! as the sequel showed, he had reason for them. He was dead— he had died from drowning. Was he dead? I started up with impatience— I remembered my promise.

"I must see to this," I murmured to myself; " the lad trusted me. That death must be verified."

I stooped and lifted up the paper which lay on the floor and carefully read the paragraph over again.

"Failure of the heart's action," I repeated. "When the body was found the head was well out of the water."

When I examined Fane's heart a short time ago it was in a perfectly healthy condition; he was a man of robust frame, in the prime of youth. Would his heart's action be likely to fail to the extent of causing death during a short swim? Then, en the other hand, his was the temperament most favourable to the cataleptic state. He had already suffered from trance. Certainly this death must be verified, and the duty lay with me. I rang the bell sharply— Harris entered with a telegram.

"The messenger is waiting," he said.

I opened the little missive, and saw to my dismay that it was a request that I should immediately visit a patient about thirty miles out of London who was taken with an apoplectic seizure. I could not go north that night. I sent a reply to the telegram, naming the train by which I would arrive at Dorking, and then stretching out my hand prepared to fill in another form. I had a moment of anxious thought before doing this. After a little reflection I decided to address my second telegram to Miss  Lefroy. It ran as follows :—

Have just seen account of accident in Westminster Gazette. Defer funeral until my arrival.

Halifax.

Both my telegrams being dispatched, I soon afterwards went off to visit my patient in the country. I found him dangerously ill, and saw that there was no chance of my leaving him that night, nor probably during the following day. The case was one of life or death, and it was impossible for me to trust it to the hands of another. Nevertheless, my promise to poor young Fane kept always rising up before me. At any cost it must be fulfilled. Harris brought me down my letters on the following morning, and amongst them was a telegram from Miss Lefroy.

" Mr. Pennington does not wish to postpone funeral— I am distracted— come at once," she wired.

To this telegram I sent an instant reply— I addressed it now boldly to Pennington himself— it ran as follows:—

I am under a promise to verify the death of Charles Fane, but am unfortunately detained here with an anxious case. Impossible for me to go north to-day. Get local doctor to verify death by opening vein.

Clifford Halifax.

I sent off the telegram, but my uneasiness continued. As the hours of the day flew by, and the patient, for whom I was fighting death inch by inch, grew gradually worse and worse, I could not help thinking of the bright-looking, happy-faced young man who yet in some ways had such a sombre history. Again and again the question forced itself upon me— Is he really dead? May not this, after all, be a second condition of trance?

At three o'clock that afternoon my patient died. I returned to town by the next train, having made up my mind to go down to Birstdale Abbey that night. When I arrived at home, Harris told me that a gentleman had called to see me who expressed regret at my absence, but said he would look in again later— he gave no name. On my consulting-room table, amongst a pile of letters, lay one telegram. I opened it first— it was from Miss Lefroy.

Why don't you come? Dr. Bland will not open vein. Coffin is to be screwed down to-night. I don't think he is dead.

Alice Lefroy.

"Harris," I said, " wait one moment. I must write a telegram, which you are to send off immediately."

I wrote one quickly, addressing it to Miss Lefroy. It ran thus :—

Am starting by the 9.15 from St. Pancras. Do not have lid of coffin screwed on.

Halifax.

I had scarcely written the words, and Harris was about to leave the room with the telegram, when there came a ring at my front door; he went to open it, and the next moment a tall, aristocratic-looking man of middle age was ushered into my presence. He came up to me with a certain eagerness, and yet with an undeniable self-repression of manner. "I must introduce myself," he said; " my name is Philip Pennington."

I was startled at seeing him, but, concealing any evidence of emotion, asked him to seat himself.

"I am glad you have called," I answered, "and you are just in time— I am about to start for your part of the world."

"I thought that highly probable," he said, "and have come here now on purpose to save you the trouble. I received your telegram at the station to-day, just when I was leaving for London— I thought the best thing I could do would be to answer it in person: but in order to assure you that no stone has been left unturned, I sent a messenger on with it to our local doctor, Bland, who, superfluous as it is, has doubtless acceded to your strange request. The poor fellow is to be conveyed to his father's place in Somersetshire early to-morrow, and the coffin, by my orders, will be fastened down to-night."

"That cannot be," I replied; "I am under a promise to Fane to verify the death. I feared this morning that I could not do so in person, but the patient who was then detaining me has since died, and I am at liberty to start for the north. I shall have just time to catch the 9. 15 train, and can examine the body early in the morning."

As I was speaking Pennington looked disturbed. He had the sort of face which can best be described as a wooden mask— the features were regular and even handsome— the eyes full and well shaped— the man wore his years lightly, too, not looking to the casual observer anything like the age I believed him to be; but the absence of all expression— the extreme thin- ness of the lips, and a certain sinister cast of the eyes inclined me not to trust him from the first. As I looked at him I understood Fane's antipathy, and wondered how, under any circumstances, Alice Lefroy could have promised herself to this man. He sat calmly in his chair now— his mental depression only visible in a certain twitch of his lips, which a man less cognizant of the human physiognomy might never have observed. While I was reading him, he was evidently reading me— his eyes travelled to a little clock on the mantelpiece which pointed to twenty minutes after eight— in a very few moments I must start for St. Pancras, if I would catch the 9.15 train.

"You will doubtless understand for yourself, doctor," he said, speaking slowly, and perhaps with the idea of killing time, "that I can have no possible dislike to your making any experiments on the body of poor young Fane. His death is most tragic, and has filled us all with the most lively sense of grief; but as he is dead— dead beyond recall— it seems to me unnecessary to excite false hopes and to waste the valuable time of a busy London doctor, on what must certainly prove a wild-goose chase."

"I understand," I answered, " but a promise is a promise, Mr. Pennington. I am obliged to you for calling, and would, perhaps, feel less inclined to go to Birstdale Abbey if my telegram of this morning had been attended to. Had your local doctor opened the vein and thus proved death beyond doubt, I should have felt that I had kept my promise to poor Fane to the best of my ability."

"Why do you assume that he has not done so?" asked Pennington.

I stretched out my hand, and taking Miss Lefroy's telegram from the table, gave it to him to read.

His thin lips twitched most visibly then, and I saw his eyelids jerk as if he had received a sort of shock.

"Then you insist on going north?" he said, abruptly.

"I do, and, pardon me, I have not a moment to lose— I have only just time to catch my train."

Pennington shrugged his shoulders.

"I can say nothing further," he answered. "I came up to town this morning to make some arrangements with regard to the funeral. As you are going to Birstdale Abbey, doctor, of course, you must come as my guest— I am also returning by the 9.15 train."

"Then will you share my hansom?" I asked.

"With pleasure," he replied.

A moment or two later we were bowling away as quickly as possible to St. Pancras Station. My companion's manner had now completely altered; he was the suave and agreeable man of the world. He kept up a continued strain of light conversation, touching, with much intelligence and force of observation, on many subjects of the day. He was a well-read man, and, I also perceived, a somewhat profound thinker. All through the conversation, however, I could not fail to perceive that he was still evidently on guard, also that he was watching me. At St. Pancras he left me for a few minutes, and I presently saw him issue out of the telegraph office. He was doubtless sending a telegram to countermand my order with regard to the coffin. If it were screwed down before we arrived, all would be lost.

I am certainly not given to premonitions, but I had a premonition almost from the moment that I heard of poor Fane's accident that he was not really dead; there was an uncomfortable want of certainty about the whole thing which made me anxious, for my own sake as well as because I had given a promise, to see this thing out myself. There is much talk at the present day of premature interment, and although far more than half the stories are utterly unworthy of credence, there is a substratum of truth in this horror, which ought to receive more serious attention than it has hitherto done. At rare intervals people in a state of trance have been committed to the grave. If Fane were only in a cataleptic state (and if a shock had produced it once, it surely might do so a second time), the fact of screwing down the coffin lid would make the assumed death in a few moments an actual one. Our train would start in three minutes. I looked full at Pennington when he came up to my side.

"You will forgive my asking you a blunt question?" I said.

"Ask what you please, Dr. Halifax," he replied, drawing himself up and looking me straight in the eyes.

"Have you sent a telegram to the Abbey countermanding my order?"

"I have not," he said, without the smallest hesitation.

There was nothing further to be said, but I knew the man lied to me. The next moment we took our seats in the railway carriage and were soon steaming out of London.

My feelings were the reverse of comfortable, but perceiving on reflection that I could now do absolutely nothing, and must wait as best I could the issue of events, I ensconced myself in a corner of the carriage and tried to court sleep. I had been up all the previous night and was naturally very weary, but the state of suspense is not conducive to slumber, and I soon found it hopeless to woo the fickle goddess.  Pennington sat opposite to me. We had two fellow- passengers in the other corners of the carriage, but they were both in the land of dreams. Pennington, on the other hand, was as wide- awake as I was. He had provided himself with a small reading lamp, which he now fastened to his side of the carriage, and taking out a copy of the Times, pretended to absorb himself in its contents. The light fell full upon his face, and I was able to watch it without being myself observed. I saw that he was in reality not reading a word. I also perceived that, notwithstanding his outward calm of demeanour, he was in truth a highly nervous man. He must have felt my eyes upon him, for he suddenly threw down his paper, and bending forward began to speak to me.

" Yes," he said, "the whole thing was most tragic."

"Tell me how it occurred," I said. " Up to the present, remember, I have only seen the very bald newspaper report."

"I fancy the newspapers have got the exact truth," replied Pennington, in his driest voice. "Fane was in the best of health and the highest spirits on Tuesday. He was, as perhaps you know, an excellent sportsman, and, as the night was fine, he asked my permission to go out duck-shooting on Loch Ardtry. Part of this magnificent piece of water belongs to my property. He intended to be home soon after midnight, and when he did not appear at the given hour, we were none of us specially alarmed. I ordered the side entrance to be left on the latch, and we all went to bed, our natural supposition being that he had found excellent sport and was loth to return home as long as the moon was high in the heavens. I rose early on the following morning, and went out just when the dawn was breaking. I was under the supposition then that Fane had been snug in his bed some hours.

"I strolled down to the margin of the lake, and one of the first objects that met my horrified eyes was the body of the unfortunate fellow— his head above water — his hands clutching some water-weeds— his eyes shut and his face cold and pallid. I saw him simultaneously with two gardeners who were on their way to work. We brought him to the house and sent for the doctor. He pronounced life extinct, and said that Fane had probably been dead for some hours. As the body was found with the head above water, the death could not be attributed to drowning, and our doctor supposed it to be due to heart failure. There had, of course, to be a coroner's inquest, which took place on Thursday morning. The verdict was, naturally, death by accident and shock. I think that is the whole story."

"Not quite," I replied. "How did Fane happen to be on the middle of the lake in an unseaworthy boat?"

"Oh, that I can't say," replied Pennington; he turned the sheet of his paper as he spoke. "The boats had not been used for some little time, but I was under the impression that they were all water-tight."

"Then the boat he used sank to the bottom of the lake?"

"Yes."

"Has it been raised?"

"Not yet; we have been too much disturbed to worry about such a trifle as the lost boat."

"Nevertheless, the boat is of great importance," I said. "With your permission, I should wish it to be raised immediately, in order that it may be examined."

" Really, doctor, you are very persistent," said Mr. Pennington, a shade of annoyance flitting for a moment round his thin lips, and as soon vanishing. " Of course, it can be done if you wish it," he added, in a few moments, "that is, when the funeral is over. Do you propose to make a long stay in the north?"

" I shall stay until I have got the business through about which I am coming down," I answered, somewhat shortly.

We relapsed into silence after this, which was broken in about half an hour's time by Pennington, who said, with a profound sigh:—

"Alice has behaved far better than I could have expected."

"She is doubtless sustained by hope," I said.

"What folly this is, doctor; you must know that there can be no possible hope— the man is as dead as a door-nail."

"Nevertheless, she does not think him dead," I replied; "but we will soon see."

An ugly smile crept round his face— he did not reply.

WE REACHED Castleton about four in the morning. Pennington's carriage was waiting for us, and we drove straight to Birstdale Abbey. As we approached the house, I saw that it was well lit up, and even noticed figures flitting behind the blinds. When our carriage wheels were heard crunching the gravel, the entrance door was flung open, a servant appeared, and the next instant a small, girlish figure ran down the steps.

"Alice, you ought to be in bed," said Pennington, in a tone of annoyance.

"Is Dr. Halifax with you?" she asked, pushing him aside.

"Yes, yes; but what does that matter to you? Have you been sitting up all night?"

" Of course I have— do you think I could rest? Dr. Halifax, please come with me at once."

"Where is he?" I asked.

She took my hand, and began to draw me, to my surprise, away from the house.

"I will take you to view the body, doctor," said Pennington— his eyes shone. "Go to bed, Alice; I insist," he cried.

"I won't obey you," she replied, flinging out her words with great excitement and defiance. "I know now that I have always hated you— I hate you at this moment beyond words to describe. Why did you dare to send that last telegram? Why did you dare to countermand Dr. Halifax's orders? But the coffin is not screwed down— I would not allow it. Come, doctor, come at once to the church— his body was laid in the church yesterday. Oh, no, it isn't only his body— not yet, not yet— it is he— himself— he only wants you to awaken him— he is only asleep— I know he is only asleep— come and wake him at once— come, come!"

She clasped my hand with passionate insistance.

Pennington stood back with a startled and stricken look on his face. Miss Lefroy hurried me down a side walk which led to a small turnstile. Passing hrough the stile we found ourselves in the churchyard. It was a little old Norman church, which, I understood afterwards, had belonged to the Penningtons for hundreds of years. The church was situated in the very centre of the estate. Lights shone through the painted glass windows; the porch was open. The excited girl led me right into the sacred building. The interior was well lighted; the brightest light centring round that part where the coffin on trestles stood. It was a massive, coffin; the shell was inclosed in lead, covered with oak; the heavy lid lay on the ground beneath. The coffin was placed in the centre of the chancel. A middle-aged servant, who looked as if she had been crying bitterly, was standing by. When she saw Alice enter, and observed that I was with her, she uttered an exclamation of thankfulness.

"Is this the good doctor you have been expecting, Miss Lefroy?"she asked.

"Yes, Merriman," replied the young lady, "this is Dr. Halifax. He has come in time, after all— my efforts were not in vain— oh, how thankful I am ! Now my darling will awaken from his sleep."

"Poor young lady," said the servant— she gave me a meaning glance as she spoke. "Poor Miss Alice, she has got the notion that Mr. Fane is only asleep; she has got it on the brain, sir, she really has."

"Please stand aside," I answered.

I went close to the coffin and looked earnestly down at the dead man's face.

"He is asleep, is he not?" repeated Alice, coming up to my side, laying her hand on my arm, and glancing first at me, and then at the dead face of her lover. "See for yourself— he only sleeps. How lifelike he looks. There is even colour in his lips. You will awaken him, won't you, doctor?"

"Poor thing, she has got it on the brain," mumbled the servant.

"Move a little away, please," I said to Miss Lefroy.

When she did so, I bent more closely over the coffin— I took the hand of the dead man in mine— it was cold and stiff— the face looked rigid— my heart sank. I could not bear to meet the agonized look in Alice Lefroy's beautiful eyes.

"After all, I greatly fear the poor fellow is dead," I said to myself. "Were it not that he has already had a cataleptic fit— were it not— but, stay— the rigidity in that hand is, after all, not quite the rigidity of the dead."

My heart beat with renewed hope. I dropped the cold hand. Miss Lefroy was looking at me with a face of such anguish that I felt certain she would faint if I did not quickly ask her to leave the church.

"He is alive— do say he is alive?" she questioned, in an almost voiceless whisper.

"I cannot say at present," I answered, "but if you will leave me I will tell you in a moment or two. I now am going to make an experiment, but cannot do so until you go. Take Miss Lefroy into the vestry-room for a few moments," I said, turning to the servant.

"No, I will stay," answered Alice.

"But I would prefer that you left me. Go now, like a good girl."

She turned then without another word. The dead man and I were alone in the church. Was the man in his coffin really dead? I should soon know. If he were alive, he was simulating death as few had done— nevertheless, he must have the chance I had promised him. I would open one of the veins. I took a case of instruments out of my pocket. As I did so, I heard the creaking noise of a door being softly shut. Pennington was coming up the aisle of the church on tip-toe. I waited for him to approach the coffin. He did so, coming close to me and looking down with a smile on his face at the dead face below.

"You see now," he said, slowly, "how much of your valuable time you have wasted in coming all this way to look at a dead man— you see also how cruelly and wantonly you have awakened false hopes!"

"Not quite yet," I answered; "stand aside, will you?"

As I spoke I bared the arm of the dead, and taking out my lancet carefully opened a superficial vein in the forearm. I heard Pennington laugh satirically— I had no time to notice his laughter then. I waited with a beating heart for the result. Would that imprisoned blood ever flow again? Had the man been in full life and health it would have flowed freely enough from the wound. The first few seconds after the division of the vein were some of the longest I ever lived through; then my heart gave a leap of triumph— a drop of blood oozed through the opening, then another, then another. Slowly, sluggishly, faintly, the blood dropped and dropped on the white winding-sheet— after the first couple of minutes it began to flow in a languid stream. I carefully raised the head. The next moment, to Pennington's horror, the dead man sat up.

THREE MONTHS afterwards I received a visit from Fane in Harley Street. He was in perfect health, and his spirits were as high as I had ever seen them.

"You have not only saved my life," he said, after he had spoken to me for a few moments, " but you have done more— you have absolutely removed the awful horror under which I lived for the last ten years. I do not expect that I shall be laid out for dead a third time before the event really takes place."

"With the passing of the horror, the tendency to catalepsy has doubtless vanished," I replied. "I am more glad than I can tell you. That was a lucky visit of mine to the north."

"Ah!" he replied, his bright face suddenly becoming grave; he came up to my side and spoke almost in a whisper. "Did you know that a hole, about the size of a pea, was found, evidently drilled in the bottom of the boat?" he said.

I started, but did not reply.

"It is true," he continued. "I dare not ask myself what it means."

"Be satisfied to leave that mystery alone," I said, after a brief pause. "You are a happy man— you are going to have a happy future. God Himself took the matter into His hands when He rescued you as He did from the very jaws of death."

__________________

3: The Cripple at the Mill

Max Pemberton

1863-1950

The Strand Magazine, Sep 1895

THE thunderstorm, which had followed me all the afternoon, promised to burst about the hour of sunset. Away to the west, the rolling vapours steamed up in fantastic shapes; there were mountains of sullen black cloud lying low in the remoter valley. The river itself took the colour of ink; the distant woods upon which the sun still fell were all lit with rich and changing colours, in fine contrast to the black and gloomy picture so near to me. I began to hear that distinct throb of the little waves which is a prelude to storm; the wind whistled hauntingly in the willows; the grasses bent to the fitful blasts; even my canoe went careering onward, as though anxious to bring me to shelter.

Supper and bed ! The words had a pleasant ring for a man who was ten miles from anywhere. I had been making a tour of the rivers of France, and having come down the Seine to my great content, had struck through the canals into the River Loire. Thence I was looking to reach the Saone, and ultimately the Rhone. Until this June day of which I write, my trip had been all that I had hoped. The perpetual sunshine, the perfect rest, the exhilaration of the exercise, the solitude, the sweetness of the rivers, had blotted London from my memory. My old canoe, bought years ago at Toronto, had been my best friend. My luggage would not have filled a decent trunk. Two suits of thick flannels served all purposes. My levee dress was a mackintosh; my morning toilet, a sweater and a pipe. And I was happy; happy, I think, beyond any oarsman that ever cut himself adrift from his fellows, and made holiday alone.

Supper and bed ! They seemed far off, indeed. I was ten leagues from Nevers, and the surrounding country was as flat as the Fens. Not the vestige of a house could I see. It was now near to being quite dark. Ugly flashes of forked lightning struck across the western sky; the wind moaned warningly; there was foam upon the wavelets. With the hope that I might yet come upon a haven, I dug my paddle into the water furiously, and the rush of waves from my bows was like music to my ears. The greater speed carried me swiftly to the point where the stream swung round sharply to the eastward. I passed a great clump of bushes, all covered with wild clematis, and then I saw the girl.

A prettier apparition never was. She sat upon the bank, weaving white moon-daisies into her hair, which fell over her shoulders almost to her waist. She wore no shoes or stockings, and, for the matter of that, her feet were in the water to her ankles. What her age was I make no pretence to tell. I remember only that her exceedingly well-shaped face and great dark eyes gave me the notion that she was very young, and her dress was fittingly picturesque, consisting only of a short skirt of scarlet, and an old black and gold bodice with white sleeves such as we look for with the typical gipsy of opera. Her feathers, however, had long since lost their fineness. The gold- lace was wofully faded; the sleeves were scrupulously white, but much torn; there were buttons wanting. None the less was the effect singularly pleasing, and the face of the girl one to attract apart from her environment.

The moment she saw my canoe, this wild creature ceased to play with the daisies in her lap, and began to stare at me. Not a muscle did she move; not a word escaped her. But her eyes were a wonder to see, and the little hands were dainty enough to call for a painter's admiration. I paused for a moment, silent in praise. Then I spoke to her with all the French I could muster.

"I am caught by the storm, little one; can you direct me to any shelter?"

She looked at me with increasing amazement, but gave me no answer. I might have been addressing a statue. I threw a franc to her. It fell almost upon her right hand, but she made no motion to pick it up; nor did she look at it, continuing instead to search me with those lustrous eyes of hers.

"There is no house here," said she, speaking at last with a very pleasant voice.

"But where do you live?" I persisted, in surprise.

"I live at the White Mill," she answered, unconcernedly.

"And where is the White Mill?"

"What eyes you have," she now cried, gaily; "the White Mill is through the trees there."

I must have been blind. When I looked for the spot she indicated, I saw the shape of a tumble-down structure showing through the trees of a scanty copse. It was not half a mile from where I was.

"Oh," said I, at the discovery; "that's where you live, is it? And is your mother there?"

She shook her head.

"Or your father?"

She answered me as before.

"Then who takes care of you?" I asked, angry at her obstinacy.

"My uncle, Maître Chalot."

"Then he will give me a bed. Sapristi, the rain is coming down already. We shall be drenched, little one. Run on and tell your uncle I am about to make his acquaintance."

She did not move; but the look of amused curiosity in her eyes passed to one of startled surprise.

"You wish to go to the mill?" she asked.

"Certainly, I wish to go; why should I not?"

"Because," she answered, slowly, "because — no one goes to Maître Chalot."

"Then all the more reason to give him company."

"Oh! but— but—"

"But what, pretty child?"

She had now started to her feet, and had snatched up the franc, which she slipped into the breast of the faded bodice. I thought for a moment that she was going to plead with me; but when she had stood for some time with the wild look in her eyes, of a sudden she ran away swiftly towards the old house, and I was alone.

"A pest on it," said I, "the little witch is mad."

Mad or sane, it was not a situation to call for serious debate. Wild gusts of wind now howled in the valley. A heavy darkness had come down with the storm. The rain and hail cut the face. The willows bent like whips. The lightning leaped from cloud to cloud in paths of blinding light. The rattle of the thunder was like the roar of unnumbered batteries. Determined to find a haven at any cost, and sublimely indifferent to the relations between Maître Chalot and his neighbours, I set down to my work, and, wet and weary as I was, the canoe flew onward to the mill.

The house proved on better acquaintance to be just as decrepit and decayed as I had thought when first I saw it. Scarce a pane in any lattice was uncracked. The thatch struggled raggedly over the eaves. One wing of the building had sunk upon its foundations and yawed away from its fellow. The high chimney above the mill had long since had a quarrel with the perpendicular. The walls were often bulging and split. The door of the parlour— for there was no such luxury as a hall— had lost a hinge. A mangy dog of all known breeds lay asleep on a heap of dirty straw in the yard. I saw that the place was built upon the bank of a little stream here flowing swiftly into the main river; and must once have been a prosperous mill. But that, I judged, was years ago.

I left my canoe in the mill-pool, then whipped into ripples by the storm; and, regardless of the fact that water streamed out of my flannels, I knocked upon the open door of the kitchen. There was a fire burning brightly in a stove, and stew-pans warming on the copper top. The whole interior was ridiculously clean for such an environment, and in spite of the warnings of the little witch, I began to congratulate myself upon the adventure. In the same moment I heard someone hobbling across the flags, and then was face to face with Maître Chalot. I was sure it was he, and at the first view of him I saw that he was a cripple, and went on crutches.

"Good evening," said he. "You are an Englishman, I suppose, and you want shelter? Well, such as I have is at your disposal. Mon Dieu, listen to the thunder."

He led the way into his cottage— you could not call it more— without another word; and I found myself sitting at the fire in a hopeless endeavour to dry my clothes. The witch of the river was not to be seen, however, and the storm now beat so violently without, and the darkness was so intense, that the old man hobbled to a cupboard and set a lamp upon his table. The light of it added to my surprise. It showed me the features of one who might well have been an abbé. Never had I seen such a gentle-looking old fellow. Silky white hair streamed upon his forehead; his face was the face of a Greek; his mouth like the mouth of a tender woman; his eyes kindly; his voice gentle. And this was the man of whom the neighbours made a hermit, and against whom my little friend had suggested cautions. What a farce!

When he had placed the lamp upon the table, Maître Chalot made haste to apologize for his shortcomings and to set supper.

"I have nothing but bread and wine to offer, monsieur," said he, hobbling about upon his crutches with surprising agility; "but such as I have, I give with all my heart. It was different when my wife was alive— but she died ten years ago. And there is no woman's hand in this house now. God be merciful to me, I am quite alone! "

"One moment," said I, feeling myself moved to pity at his obvious distress. " I met a young girl on the river's bank half a mile from here. She declared she was your niece!"

When I said this, a swift look of hatred passed over his striking face. He brought down his fist with a bang upon the table so that the glasses he had set danced again.

"My niece she is," cried he, "and with such am I visited for my sins. Oh, she is a lazy creature, monsieur— she is a waif and stray who will come to mischief. Heaven forgive me for saying it. Never was good known of her. She will not go to school; she will not work at home. She is a plague to me. Even the clergy speak of her from the pulpit, saying, 'Be warned by Fifine of the mill.' What a misfortune for you to speak with her."

I said nothing in answer to his appeal; but his words seemed to be confirmed by the absence of the girl when we sat down to his poor supper, and afterwards to pipes in the settle. The crisis of the storm had now passed, but the wind still howled dismally in the river valley, and roared under the eaves of the old house with a sound as of human moaning and distress. Yet not a sight of the girl had I seen, and I began to be anxious about her.

"Tell me," said I, filling my glass with the revoltingly sour Bordeaux he offered to me, "where is Fifine now?"

"God knows," cried he, "everywhere— anywhere. She is like a Will-o'-the-wisp. Do not trouble your head about her. I never do— she is not worth a thought."

He turned the subject deftly, going on to tell me that others of my own countrymen had passed down the Loire recently, seeking to reach the Saone, and that two of them had stayed in his house.

"You English," said he, "how gay you are. To row about in boats no bigger than that— oh, it is droll. And not to care if you have a pillow for your head or a dinner to eat! Ma foi! what a nation ! "

He laughed at the humour of the thing, and poured me out another glass of the sour wine. He was just about to resume the subject when we both heard a heavy, dull sound as of hammering, a sound which appeared to come from a room next to our own; and at this he sprang up upon his crutches and hobbled away to listen. In the minute that I was alone I heard a sharp cry like the cry of a girl who had been struck, but it was not repeated, and when the old man came back to me he was still smiling.

"What a night," said he, apparently in explanation; "what a wind! Did you hear the dog yelping? I have shut him in the cellar. Holy Mother, I would not turn a cur away in such a storm."

"Then what about your niece?" asked I, beginning to feel some slight distrust of him in spite of myself.

"She is in bed," said he, looking at me sharply. "Oh, never fear, she can take care of herself. If anyone suffers, it will not be Fifine."

I knew not what to think, what to say in answer to him. I could have sworn that I had heard a child cry out; and yet here was this smiling old cripple appearing to be the spirit of all benevolence and good. The thing was becoming a mystery. I recalled again the pitiful, dazed look of the girl; I remembered her startled exclamation when I had proposed to go to the mill. And I could not drive it out of my mind that I was quite alone with this saintly cripple; that there was no other house within many miles of his. These things, I say, occurred to me, and yet it is not to be thought that I feared the man. After all, he was old and lame; I was young, and had the strength of perfect health. I knew that I could take him up with one hand, if need be, and pitch him out of his own window. Nevertheless, a certain indefinable sense of dread came upon me once or twice while I sat in that gloomy kitchen. The dim light casting bands of black shadow upon the damp-stained wall; the sob of the wind about the gables; the reddening fire glowing upon the face of my host; the tick of the clock so plainly to be heard; the knowledge of the loneliness of the marshes without, contributed to the impression. I began to feel that the very atmosphere of the room was oppressive; the company of the man unbearable. Talk as much as he might, I could not find it in me to reply to him; and nine o'clock had scarce been struck upon his crazy old clock when I said that I would go to bed.

He found the suggestion a good one. "Without doubt, you have come far and are tired," said he. "I am distressed to offer you such a poor bed, but it is my best. It was different when my wife lived. Oh, monsieur, what a woman she was. So clean, so neat— such an example. God rest her soul."

As he said this, he produced a tiny brass lamp and lit it. Then he held it aloft and began, very dexterously, to pitch himself forward upon his crutches, leading me down a dark passage towards the yawing gable. He went so fast that I was some paces behind him as he reached the angle of the passage, and in this moment I was conscious of a light step behind me. I turned quickly, and found myself almost touching the face of the girl Fifine. But the look in her eyes was one I shall never forget.

"Well, pretty child," said I, in a whisper, "what do you want?"

"I— I want to tell you," she said, gasping for her breath— "don't go— don't sleep— you were kind to me. Oh, don't listen to him. He will—"

What more she would have said I can't for the life of me tell, for that moment the old man called out, and she vanished like a sunbeam.

The passage was now quite dark, save for a ray of moonlight which fell through a tiny lattice high above me; and with the girl's words ringing unpleasantly in my ears, I began to grope my way back to the kitchen. There, at any rate, I could see the danger that menaced me. But in that dark place I knew not what might come. A hundred fears, a hundred possibilities, leapt into my mind. Uncertain, half-convinced, puzzling still upon the enigma, I had taken half-a-dozen steps towards the room I had left, when the light of the man's lantern flashed again at the far end of the passage, and he called to me:—

"Your room is quite ready, monsieur."

He stood waving the light, and I, in turn, paused and looked at him. For the thought had come to me suddenly: what if the girl should have been set to this work; what if it was her design to drag me back to the kitchen? I asked myself: were there other men in the house beside the cripple? What was the sound of hammering I had heard. Why had someone cried out? It seemed to me even in the face of the child's warning that I should fare better if I kept my fears to myself and did not come openly to a statement of them. That would give me time at any rate, and I could look but to my own wits for the rest. As well might a man have cried out for help in the cellars of the Inquisition as in that lonely house.

"This way, monsieur; peste, how dark it is, but there are no steps. Permit me to go first with the lantern."

With these words the cripple raised the light so high that its rays were cast upon my face. To have hesitated longer would have been to have brought the thing immediately to a head. Had I known what I know now, I would have taken this course; but in my uncertainty, I thought it better to follow him, and keeping at his heels, I turned the angle of the passage and came to my bedroom. It was a small panelled apartment, with so tiny a window that a dog scarce could have entered through it. A low and very plain iron bedstead, a worn and tattered mat, a tin washstand, and a big deal cupboard furnished it. The place was both bare and dirty, and smelt strongly of damp. A shudder ran through me when the man set down the lamp and again began to apologize for putting me in such a place. But I was anxious to be quit of him; and with a curt word, I sent him about his business.

Directly I was alone, I seemed able to breathe again. How it was I know not, but the very company of that lame man set all my nerves twitching. Now, however, I was rid of him, and scarce had his step died away in the passage before I was at work. Instinctively, I felt that my very life depended upon what I could do in the next ten minutes. As a first thought I turned to the door and examined it. It wanted both lock and key; in fact, it swung loose upon its hinges and was worth no more than a door of paper. The idea that I would bar it with the heavy wardrobe was entertained for a moment, only to be rejected as quickly. Two men could not have moved that cumbrous contrivance; and when I had assured myself of this, I bethought me of the bed. What if I drew the bed across the opening, and so slept with the knowledge that anyone passing into the room must pass over me? It was a good notion, but I put it aside when I remembered what a cabined den I was in. Better far to creep out to the river again— better anything than the gloom and chill and silence of that reeking chamber. And this at last I resolved to do, coming to believe, as I reasoned it out again, that the girl was my friend, the cripple my enemy.

Firm in this purpose, I pushed a chair against the door and sat upon the bed. I had taken off my coat in my endeavours to move the wardrobe, and now I sat in my shirt-sleeves, having first got my pocket-book which contained my money and thrust it into my belt. My knapsack lay upon the chair at the door, but I did not open it; meaning, when half an hour had gone, to crawl down the passage and make a bolt for it. For the first time in the history of my travels, I began to curse my folly in refusing to carry a revolver. Until that time I had laughed at those who did so, but I laughed no more. Nay, as I sat there, starting at every whisper of the wind and creak of the boards, I remembered that a pistol might have saved my life— and for my life I knew that I must fight.

Ten minutes, perhaps, had passed of the half-hour which I had set myself, when the little lamp flickered and went out. The light that now came down from the lattice showed me that the storm had broken, and that the moon was struggling through the clouds. But for the most part, the room was in utter darkness. I could not see my hand before my face; I feared to move from my bed lest any trap should be set for me. Once I thought I heard the sound of dripping water; the howl of the dog in the yard struck up weird and chilling; but these done with, the old silence fell, a silence so profound that I could hear the ticking of my watch as it lay in the pocket of my coat. At last I determined to bear with it no longer, and, well or ill, to leave that dreadful vault. It was as if the whole place were filled with ugly shadows, with the spirits of the murdered dead who haunted it. The temptation to cry out was unbearable. I seemed to feel that a face looked into mine, that dead men come to life were breathing upon me with warm breath.

With my nerve thus shattered and my hands almost trembling, I snatched up my knapsack and my coat, and pulled the chair from the door. A stream of light flooded the room at the action, and I found myse'lf, to my amazement, face to face with Maître Chalot. So great was the surprise of it, to see him standing there with his lantern raised and his smiling face, that the words I would have spoken stuck upon my lips. Nor was he at all abashed by my confusion.

"A thousand pardons, monsieur," said he; "I am distressed beyond words to wake you, but I had forgotten to point out the other door in your room, which I beg you to avoid. It is an old affair, opening above the mill-wheel which once was the pride of this place. I beg of you let me show it, lest any mischance should befall you."

He gave me no time to say aye or no, and quite put off my guard, I watched him hobble across the room, and open a panel in the wall. A rush of noxious air streamed into the apartment as he did so, and his lamp came near to being extinguished.

"Look for yourself, monsieur," said he, resting back upon his crutches, and waving the lamp with his hand, "what a dirty place it is. Oh, that I must ask you to sleep above such a thing. But what would you? I have no other room."

While he had been speaking I had taken two strides towards the hole. His words were fair; his attitude defied suspicion. A cripple, leaning back upon his crutches, with his hands above him: what harm could he do to me? I saw that he was helpless, but none the less I kept back from him, quelling the curiosity which would have led me to gaze into the pit.

"Will you not look, monsieur?" he asked again, when I hesitated. "It is the old mill-wheel, but the sluice runs no longer. Ah! what a place this was when the water made music all the day."

He said this, and the words were hardly out of his lips when the crisis came. I suppose that I had taken another step towards him, led on by his chatter. Be that as it may, while I was beginning to assure myself once more that he was honest, and that the girl had lied, he astounded me by dropping back upon his crutches, and falling heavily to the floor. The lamp fell with him, extinguishing itself as it dropped. We were in utter darkness, and he lay at my feet, moaning most dismally.

"Mon Dieu, monsieur," he now cried, "help me up, for pity's sake. I have broken my leg. Oh, what pain I suffer."

His cries were horrible, and without a thought of any treachery, I put out my hand to help him. No sooner had he gripped it, however, than a shudder ran over my body, and the whole of the man's purpose was revealed to me. For his grip was like a grip of iron; it crushed my hand until I thought that the fingers were broken; it threatened to pull my arm from its socket; the pain of it was agonizing. Struggle as I would, the cripple drew me down to him; I felt his breath warm upon my face; I could hear him gnashing his teeth in the struggle; the blows I rained upon his head might as well have been struck on a ball of stone; he had the strength of a maniac, the cruelty of a beast. And presently he had got both his arms around me, and I was pressed up against his chest, while his left hand fixed itself upon my throat and clutched me like a collar of steel.

Long minutes seemed to me in my agony to pass as the pair of us struggled on the floor of that horrible, vault-like chamber. Over and over we rolled; again and again he forced me towards the foul pit which the open door had revealed; again and again, with some terrible effort, I dragged him backward. At one moment lying beneath him gasping for my breath, seeing strange lights before my eyes, hearing the sound as of heavy wheels rolling in my ears, in the next I was above him, striking him with all my force, beating his face until I could feel the blood upon my hands. But he had the strength of ten men; his arms were like wire ropes; I knew that he was wearing me out. At the last, when he had fixed his teeth in my arm, and had almost blinded me with his nails, I dropped limp in his arms, and I remember only that he rolled me over and over, and that I fell with a low cry upon my lips into the darkness of the pit.

Weak as I was, the fall did not stun me. I had looked in the terrors of imagination to go straight down until I struck the filthy water he had called me to see; but I fell no more than five feet, and lay, gasping for my breath, upon that which appeared to be a board covered with slime and mud. But the dread of the place was no less horrible; the conviction that I had not many minutes to live no less strong. Stinking odours of weed and ooze almost stifled me; the intolerable darkness was broken only by one ray of light which struggled through a gap in the slates high above me; the patter of rats in the slimy gutter was very plainly audible; I felt that I should die in the place; that my grave was to be there. The thought was an agony beyond anything I could conceive.

To tell all that I suffered as I lay in the darkness of that well— my strength gone, my face cut and bruised, my fingers crushed, my head on fire— is beyond any art of mine. I know only that I would have preferred death in any shape to the inconceivably repulsive suggestions of the pit; would have ended my life there and then had it been in my power. Minutes passed, and I was afraid even to move a hand lest I should roll from the place whereon I rested to the unknown dangers of the dark water below. The trickle of the stream as it swelled slowly through the tunnel, the sport and splash of the rats, the patter of rain upon the roof, were the only sounds I heard. The light was so faint that even the shape of the well was hidden from me. The silence in the room above was absolute.

How long I lay wondering where my body would be when day broke I shall never know. Hours seemed to pass and find me still upon that refuge. A dreamy sense, coming of weakness and the desire to sleep, crept over me. The scampering rats no longer set my brain burning. I was content to rest and wait for death. And in this new mood of my exhaustion I heard the trap above me open of a sudden, and the pit was lighted with a very blaze of light. I looked up and saw the cripple poised there upon his crutches, a flaming torch in his hand. For a minute he stood like some human vulture; his eyes outstanding, his face still bloody. Then he closed the trap with a snap, and I was alone with the darkness. But his torch had shown me where I lay, and the mystery of my prison was no longer hid from me.

I had fallen, as it proved, upon a palette of the mill-wheel itself, a wheel now shattered and broken and firmly jammed upon its axle. High above me was the sluice-gate, through the cracks of which the water dribbled; before me was a tunnel, leading as I surmised to the river. But all the walls around bore the slime of centuries upon them; the water below me was like ink; fantastic masses of dirty weed hung from the wood of the wheel; the air was heavy with evil odours; and of possibility of escape I saw none. No acrobat could have scaled those slippery walls; or, scaling them, could have found any hole through which to drag his body. I had heard the cripple bolt and bar the trap; of other way, save the way of the tunnel, there was no sign. And I felt that sooner than face the horrors of that, I would die a hundred deaths.

It may be, if no other impulse had come, that I had carried out this intention of despair and remained lying upon the palette of the wheel until the end of it. It was only with a shudder that I could look down to the tunnel. The very suggestion that I should face it and risk all in an attempt to swim to the river chilled me to the marrow. And yet as the minutes went, the words, "That is your only hope," kept ringing in my head and would not be denied. I answered them with a low cry of mental pain; I prayed to God that death might come to me in any shape but this.

There was now a little more light in the pit. I knew that the dawn had broken, and fell to watching a ray of the sunshine which shone upon the dark pool. For many minutes I watched it in the determination that, whatever should be, I would think no more of the tunnel. The process became interesting, as little things will when great dangers press upon us. I observed the line of the water and the angle at which the beam fell. I looked again and, with a sudden overwhelming despair, I marked a change. The water was rising in the pit!

With what eagerness I watched that line in the next ten minutes no pen may tell. Inch by inch, from brick to brick, the stream mounted. I saw the dark mass begin to swirl in the tunnel; the sound of rushing water struck upon my ears; the splash of the rats ceased. While the light became stronger minute by minute, and searched more deeply the recesses of the pool below, I beheld the rising line of the river as a man might behold the sword which presently is to strike him.

The water rose. It had touched my feet now. I felt it swilling about my ankles, cold and chilling. The eddies of the pool had almost become rapids. A murmur as of a subterranean river thundering grew louder every instant. The wheel shook and trembled so that I could scarce hold to it. Despair, fear of death, more than all fear of the tunnel, searched my very bones.

Though I knew that I must die, that many minutes could not pass before the filthy water choked me, nevertheless I clung to the wheel as though it were my only haven; clung to it while all around the current foamed, and the eddies swirled, and the air was damp with the spray; clung to it until, with a great crash and sound of tearing, it flung me from my hold, and I was sucked down into the pit with the river roaring in my ears and the darkness of the tunnel upon me.

Until this moment I do not think that any word but one had escaped me during all the intense mental suffering of the night; but I remember that as I fell from the wheel, a second loud cry, in which all my overwhelming misery seemed to find expression, burst from my lips. After that I almost lost consciousness, while the current hurled me headlong into the utter darkness of the tunnel. Now gasping for my breath, now plunged deep down, with the waters foaming over my face, now cut by the jagged stones, I was swept onward to the river— onward until my body struck heavily upon some obstacle, and I found myself, I know not how, with my hands upon an iron bar and my head above the water. For a moment I welcomed the support, clung to it as to life itself. Then, as the nature of it and its meaning made itself plain to my burning brain, I thought that here, indeed, was the crisis, here in truth the place of my death.

The tunnel was barred by an iron grating!

For what cause this obstacle was so placed, unless it was to prevent the mud silting up into the pool above, I do not pretend to know. But I can never forget the moments I spent beating upon it with my hands, tearing at its bars, feeling myself crushed by the weight of water upon me, fighting in very despair as a man will fight for his life. All around me the current thundered, flowing over my shoulders, running from my face, streaming from my hair. The spray went near to choking me again and again. The darkness was intense; the air fetid. I knew that I was to die, and yet my whole soul revolted against the thought that my grave should be there in that unspeakable pit. The very confinement, the vault-like arch of bricks; the sense of the utter hopelessness of my situation, only drove me to new efforts. I fought at the grating as at some human Opponent who stood in my path; I pressed upon it until my arms were torn and bruised; I felt my strength ebbing, a horrid dizziness coming upon me; and still I held myself above the waters.

This growing weakness, the knowledge that moments scarce could pass before the end must come, awakened me to my supreme effort. I got my foot upon the tunnel's bed; and with both hands gripping one of the bars, I drew myself back, having the design to throw all my weight upon the grating. To my inexpressible amazement, the bar, which would yield to no pressure in the direction of the river, came away in my hands as I forced myself back from it. The whole grating, rotting in its frame of brick, fell with the bar. The stream, gathering new force with the removal of the obstacle, now carried me forward like a match. The waters seethed and roared around me; I was buried deep beneath them, dashed headlong against the slimy walls, hurled onward to the very depths of the vault. And then, in a moment, the scene passed. The inky blackness of the current changed to a golden green; the roar of the stream passed from my ears; I knew that the sun was shining above me; I raised my arms and, striking upward, I found myself in the mill-pool, with my own canoe not ten yards from my hand.

Upon an island half a mile from the house I changed my flannels. Nothing, strange to say, had been touched of the few necessaries I carried in the canoe, but the cripple had seized my pocket-book as we struggled together upon the floor, and I concluded that he had also my watch, unless it was that I had left it in the pit. But no money would have tempted me back to that house. The very thought of it chilled my blood and made my nerves quake. I had paddled a couple of miles, perhaps, and had come near to a little village lying hid in a pretty wood, when to my great surprise I saw the girl Fifine sitting upon the river's bank.

She was crying bitterly; but when I would have spoken to her, she fled to the woods and was instantly lost to sight. It was only when many months had passed that I learnt from a neighbouring abbe how much I owed to her. She had broken the cog-wheels of the mill-sluice with a hammer, while I supped with Maitre Chalot, and so maimed them that the water but half-filled the tunnel. I owe it to her alone that I was not drowned like a dog. At Roanne, I wired to England for money, borrowing meanwhile of the priest, who heard my tale with little amazement.

When I had strength enough to let my painter go— and an hour must have passed before such strength came to me— I paddled quickly to the main stream of the Loire, and fled the White Mill as a man flees a pestilence. Not a sign of the cripple or of the girl, Fifine, could I see. Even the cur no longer howled upon the heap of dirty straw. A suggestive stillness reigned in all the house. It were as if no human thing had entered it for centuries.

"The man has long been suspected," said he; "but what can we do? He is probably on his way to Paris by this time."

Such an argument was quite unanswerable. The French police appreciated it— and did nothing.

______________________

4: The Hidden Egyptian Shield

Charles J. Mansford.

1863-1943

The Strand Magazine, Sep 1895

One of a series of stories titled "Gleams from a Dark Continent", which followed the further adventures of the explorers of "Shafts from an Eastern Quiver", 1893.

"BE patient, sahib," said Hassan, our guide, as he glanced into my companion's face, which indicated plainly enough the latter's vexation at the delay just then hindering our advance.

"Patient!" exclaimed Denviers. "How can you expect my stock of patience not to be exhausted under the circumstances  We ought to be fifty miles farther on our way than we are. For three days have we been kept dancing attendance on this petty African chief."

"The sahib is always in a hurry," commented Hassan, gravely. "Whether on the day's march, or listening to a story from his slave, it is ever the same— the end is what he seeks. Now, if it had been Allah's will for the sahib to be an Arab, he would consider the matter differently— for has not the Great Prophet declared that to chase time is to waste time; to avoid the rush of life is to travel with the wise?"

"I daresay he has," responded Denviers; " but if Mahomet had had to deal with this Kwembi, he might have changed his opinion and been as eager to get out of this part of Africa as we are."

"I certainly agree with you there, Frank," I said to Denviers; "for, of all the tax-gatherers we have had to deal with, Kwembi is, without doubt, the most exacting. We sent him the usual forced presents, and, as you are aware, he promptly and modestly demanded three times the amount of our offerings. No sooner did he get what he asked for than he declared we had some secret purpose in view in attempting to pass through his territory. You and I and Hassan have all tried to get an audience with Kwembi, but, so far, we nave dismally failed."

"Kass," Denviers said to the leader of our Wadigo followers, who joined us as we stood discussing matters under the shade of a beautifully-foliaged makoondee tree, "we sent you to talk Kwembi's head man over, and to promise him a few yards of cloth if he succeeded in getting us an interview: what had he to say?"

"Kwembi refuses to allow an advance; he demands a good rifle— in return he will receive the white chiefs in his palace. After that ye may return, but not otherwise."

"So this petty chief, or King, as he styles himself, considers us as his prisoners?" commented Denviers. " If Kwembi delays us much longer we will try to force our way through his territory, which he will presently discover. As to the rifle, I hope he may get it."

"The sahib is making two great mistakes," Hassan interposed, gravely. "Kwembi is not a petty chief— he has a large number of men, well trained to fight with spear and shield. If that prove to be correct which Hassan, the unworthy latchet of the sahib's shoe, has heard, then the gift of a rifle will be well bestowed if it bring the sahibs into Kwembi's presence."

"What do you mean, Hassan?" Denviers asked, as he saw the Arab was evidently impressed with Kwembi's importance, by the earnest manner in which he urged the gift to be made.

"See!" cried Kass. "Kwembi already sends for an answer." As he spoke the Wadigo pointed to a number of natives advancing towards us.

"Give the rifle, sahibs," Hassan added; "to-day Kwembi only demands one; tomorrow he may desire three before letting us depart." The Arab stopped suddenly, for the natives had reached us and were forcibly repeating the chief's request, saying that he would not wait; we must send a definite answer at once.

The native who delivered Kwembi's message wore a scanty loin-cloth of leopard-cat skin, his arms being partly covered with interlacing strips of the same hide. About his neck was a loose chain of copper, twisted into curious shapes, while his black hair was raised into a head-dress in which several strings of beads were interwoven. In one hand he carried a heavy spear shod with iron, while in the other he held a wand of polished black wood, as a token that he was the King's messenger to us. His attendants, who were six in number, wore girdles and aprons made of antelope skin; about their necks were strings of black and scarlet beads ; each wore bracelets and anklets of plaited and dyed grass, while to our great discomfort they carried native musical instruments, made of reeds, with the noise of which we were almost deafened.

I hurriedly sent Hassan into the hut which had been allotted to us, from which he returned bringing a rifle with him. Taking the weapon in one hand, I pointed with the other towards Kwembi's palace to indicate that the King's terms were accepted. Denviers offered little objection, since Hassan had excited his curiosity somewhat, and this addition to the hongo, or tax, which we had already paid, was, after all, as I successfully urged, only of small value.

Headed by the King's wand-bearer and musicians, we advanced to the palace, Hassan and Kass following as we passed through a double line of armed men drawn up to receive us. No sooner were we conducted into Kwembi's presence than we understood the full meaning of Hassan's words, as we stared in blank surprise at the scene before us.

The main apartment of Kwembi's palace was extremely lofty, its sloping, cone-shaped roof being thatched with reeds, while the sides were made of a material resembling rosewood, and upon them was hung a large number of weapons, mostly shields and spears, taken, so we concluded, from surrounding tribes when defeated in war. About the palace, and ranged on left and right of a dais covered with skins, stood a number of the chief's warriors, the military bearing of whom won involuntary expressions of admiration from us as we hastily glanced at them while we stood, considerably astonished, before Kwembi and his native wife. The latter, although belonging to an African tribe, as the colour of her skin at once betrayed, was strikingly handsome in appearance. Clad in garments which suited a European rather than a native Queen, the richness of her robes and the splendid strings of pearls woven in the meshes of her luxuriant black hair were only equalled by her clear-cut features and dark, lustrous eyes. Yet the unexpected meeting with the Queen was less astonishing to us than the appearance of Kwembi, the chief. He had the garb of an Arab down to its minutest detail— but the spotlessly white turban which he wore was not lighter in hue than the chief's features, and, when he addressed a few words of welcome to us, which were, however, not over cordial, I could not help giving utterance to the thought which was uppermost:—

"Why!" I cried, "can it be possible that you are an Englishman?"

Kwembi answered gravely in the affirmative and whispered a few words to the Queen beside him. She held out her hand and, as Denviers bent over it, she said, in tolerably good English:—

"Why are these messengers of ours so careless? They reported the arrival of three Arab traders with their dependents; one of you only is an Arab—"

"He is our guide," explained Denviers; then, a little disconcerted at the great reserve which the so-called Kwembi adopted towards us, he added: "We have brought the rifle which you requested," and he held it out to the strange chief, who critically examined it and returned it immediately.

"Very suitable for a savage, I have no doubt," he said, coolly. "I should be very sorry to use it myself," and he proceeded to discuss the various defects of the rifle with such acumen that we felt he was not to be trifled with.

"Well," commented Denviers, when some stools had been placed for us before the dais and made comfortable with some leopard-cat skins spread upon them; "you have already demanded a very heavy hongo, or tax, from us, and we thought your request for a rifle hardly fair. Now that we have discovered, to our surprise, that you are an Englishman, living as chief over this African tribe, we will give you a splendid rifle on condition that you permit us to pass through your territory— which, no doubt, you will readily allow."

Kwembi made no reply in the direct affirmative to this remark, but seemed to force our conversation into the most trivial channel that he could. Kass was sent to bring back a fine weapon from our small stock, and this, Kwembi, when the Wadigo returned, accepted with considerable alacrity, although he tried to appear indifferent to its value. Denviers importuned him to allow us to continue our advance ; but, while Kwembi was willing enough to permit our return, he pointedly refused to accede to my companion's request.

"Why are you so much opposed to our expedition?" Denvers asked, vexed at the chief's obstinacy.

"What is your real object in wishing to pass through my territory?" Kwembi inquired, answering one question with another.

"I have already explained," replied Denviers. "Before starting on our way, we planned the route carefully; naturally enough, we wish to keep to it."

"Can you furnish me with any proof that what you say is true?"

"Why you mistrust your own countrymen so is more than I can understand," responded Denviers; "however, let this convince you that there is no secret object that we wish to carry out." He drew from his pocket a sheet of paper stiffened with linen, and, unfolding it, held it out to Kwembi.

"The plan of your journey," commented the chief, as he scrutinized the red wavy line showing our route. "I see two peculiar marks upon it," he added, after a pause ; "what are they intended to signify?"

" They show as near as possible the position of two places at which unexpected adventures have befallen us," I interposed. "That is all."

"Then you are not in search of the shield, to get which several Arab traders have fitted out expeditions of late, and, concealing their true object, have tried to get my permission to go through my territory?"

"We know nothing about it," Denviers answered, with a glance of surprise at me. "Surely the cause of your objection to our advance cannot be because of such a slight reason?"

"Wait!" Kwembi interrupted. "You are evidently speaking without knowledge of the rumour which has long been current among the Arabs, that I know more about this strange shield than I care to tell."

The chief whispered something to his consort, who rose and passed into a side apartment of the palace, at the same time that, by a wave of his hand, Kwembi dismissed his savage guards.

"The Arabs I dare not trust, and to make another expedition in search of the shield, after what has already happened to me, is more than my nerves would bear. If you will solemnly promise to endeavour to recover it for me, I will allow you to go on your way, which, strangely enough, passes the spot where the shield is hidden. More than that, I will present you with this ring."

Kwembi drew from his finger a remarkable ring, which he held out to Denviers, who, after we had examined it curiously, returned it to the chief.

"It is yours," Kwembi continued, pressing it upon Denviers; "take it, and accept my terms."

"We will serve you in any way possible," my companion answered. " Do you fully realize the strange nature of your gift ? "

Kwembi answered in the affirmative, and when Denviers had passed the ring to Hassan, to place with our other treasures, the chief continued:—

"You wonder how I came by it ? Well, I found it in a tomb, and it answers exactly to the description of that once worn by Menes, the first King of Egypt."

Denviers gave an incredulous whistle, then said, with a smile:—

"Of course, you don't expect us to believe your yarn? Our Arab guide often—"

"You need not believe it unless you like," Kwembi retorted ; then, going towards the entrance of the palace, he gave some order. A minute afterwards some native women entered, bearing a table curiously constructed out of reeds.

When they had departed, Kwembi left us alone for a time, then re-entered and placed upon the table a discoloured and ragged sheet of parchment, which he unrolled as we gathered round it, and then we saw that it was covered with hieroglyphics.

"When first I found this parchment and became aware of what it contained," Kwembi continued, "I thought its narrative only the invention of some ancient Egyptian priest. Like you, I was incredulous; but listen, I will tell you what transpired in consequence of the discovery of this worm-eaten scroll, and, queer as the story is, you will have an opportunity of verifying it."

When we had inspected the parchment to our satisfaction, Kwembi took it in his hand, and sat down upon his throne again. Denviers was invited to occupy the seat at the King's side, while Hassan and I rested upon the stools previously place'd before the throne. Kass, holding his shield and spear, sank down on one knee, Wadigo fashion, whereupon Kwembi at once began his narrative, referring occasionally to the scroll at first; while, throughout the story, we listened attentively, the King's animated utterances impressing us that he, at all events, believed what was upon the parchment, and also that the singular termination to his adventure had no other solution than the one he gave us.

ii

"OF THE events which led to the discovery of this parchment I shall only give you a very brief account," Kwembi began; "except to mention that, for several years, I and another Englishman devoted ourselves to research among the tombs of Meydum, in which, as you are doubtless aware, were found some extremely ancient sculptures. The success which followed our first efforts led us to visit many of the tombs which are to be found in the valley of that mysterious river— the Nile. It so happened that one day we discovered a sarcophagus and, among the treasures buried with the mummy of a woman which it contained, we found several strings of pearls. Some of these you no doubt observed adorning the hair of my consort when you first saw her on entering this palace. In addition to them we discovered the ring you now have, and which is minutely described in the hieroglyphics of this worm-eaten parchment, although, owing to the great age of the latter, here and there small fragments are missing, as well as some parts of it being difficult to clearly decipher.

"The events narrated in the parchment aroused our interest considerably, for some strange details concerning Menes, the Egyptian, are given upon it."

"There are many mythical stories told of this King," Denviers interposed. "Although this parchment may refer to Menes, it does not follow that the one who traced the hieroglyphics upon it witnessed the events recorded there. They may have been written hundreds of years after the occurrence took place, and possibly were put down upon hearsay."

"Menes," Kwembi continued, "was visited on one occasion by the Queen of a far country who was more lovely, if one may judge from this scroll, than the famous Cleopatra, destined, long after the great King passed away, to sit upon his throne. A wonderful journey was hers, for here I read that she crossed a sea then unknown, the primitive fleet of boats which hers headed being tossed for many days and nights upon the storm-swept waters. At last the mouth of the Nile stream was entered, and down the mystic river the Queen and her retinue passed. The wondrous scenes which opened out, as the current swept them on, charmed the eyes of the Queen as she stretched out her hand at times and plucked from the bank the blossoms of the mimosa. Yet fairer than anything there the Queen herself appeared, as well an attendant prince knew who sat at her feet and caught the glances of delight from her eyes, turned upon all else but him— her subject.

"A great festival was held to celebrate the Queen's visit, while Menes, smitten with love for the Queen, begged her to share his throne, which eventually she did. Among the many gifts bestowed by the Queen upon the Egyptian King when first she visited his land was a shield, curiously wrought in gold, inset in which was a three-headed serpent of magnificent brilliants, the eyes and darting tongues being of rubies. Beside the King one day, as he sat upon the throne, stood a slave who held the shield, while, at the feet of his bride, her favourite female slave rested, or at times let her fingers stray over the strings of a sweet-tuned lyre as she sang of the land whence Menes' Queen had come, and to rule which in her name a subject prince was set.

"Long before this time the chief prince who accompanied her had besought the Queen to be his— but was refused. No sooner did Menes obtain his bride than the disappointed suitor began to scheme against both King and Queen. With the object of stirring up a revolt in the far land, he begged to be sent to rule it, but Menes advised another to be chosen, and the thwarted prince prepared for revenge. He entered the audience-room of the palace with a weapon concealed upon his person; approaching Menes, he begged to whisper some strange news into the King's ear. Deceived by his friendly manner, Menes stooped down. On high the weapon flashed in an instant, but the bearer of the shield was too quick and caught upon it the descending blow. Quick as lightning strikes, the prince aimed a blow at the startled Queen! Before her the slave, who had been resting at her feet, but who had arisen when Menes was threatened with death, flung her own body, and as the weapon pierced her breast she gave one wild cry and fell dead! Down from the hand of its bearer fell the shield, and when he raised it the slave's life-stream had died it crimson.

" 'Seize him!' cried Menes; then, as the hastily summoned slaves dragged the prince away, Menes led his Queen from the apartment. Next day the fate of the prince was announced to him. Never again could the eyes of Menes' bride look upon the shield stained with the blood of the one who had saved her life. The prince was thrust living into a sarcophagus, after being led fast bound to a remote tomb near the source of the Nile, and with him was buried the shield and the weapon he had taken life with. The female slave was embalmed and buried with the King's death gifts of pearls and a ring from his finger, while this parchment was placed in her tomb, that if in after ages the sarcophagus chanced to be opened, the memory of the slave's devotion to the Queen, even to death, might be recorded."

"And you found the tomb in which the body of the female slave was placed?" I asked, as Kwembi concluded that part of his story.

"That is the least astonishing part of what happened," he answered. "So convinced was my companion at the time that every word upon the parchment was true, that he persuaded me to join him in a search for the tomb of the prince with whom the shield was buried, which, from the description given of it, you will understand was of great value. Month after month we searched and tomb after tomb we found, till at last—"

Kwembi broke off his story suddenly, and glancing into his face, I saw that he had turned ghastly pale, while the perspiration stood in beads upon his forehead.

"You found at last?" Denviers suggestively remarked, vaguely wondering at the agitation which had seized Kwembi.

"My story has a strange ending, one that you will hardly credit, yet I will endeavour to tell you as well as I can what happened," the chief continued. "Yes, we found the tomb of the nameless prince at last. Like most of the ancient burial places, it had an entrance chamber. Passing into this we saw the shaft at our feet. The two fellahs who acted as our servants lowered us in turn by a rope, and we found ourselves in a vault, whereupon we lit a torch and examined ther place for the sarcophagus. Judge of our surprise when none was discovered ! The event was so unusual that we discussed its meaning as we glanced into each other's face, lit up by the torch which I held. At last an idea occurred to my companion, who called up the shaft, in response to which an iron pick was let down at the end of our rope. Taking this implement, which long experience had taught him to handle deftly, he struck upon the sides of the vault. Hard and ringing was the sound each blow gave until, just as I was about to renew the torch, which was burning low, my companion cried:—

" 'It is here! The sarcophagus has been walled in!' With excited blows he struck the wall, which yielded far more readily than we expected— but lower burnt the torch.

"In the surprise which the discovery roused in us we thought of nothing else save the one fact that the sarcophagus was placed on end, as we saw when the facing of stone was torn away.

"Lower, lower still, burnt the torch. Then the lid of the sarcophagus was wrenched away. I caught one glimpse of the mummy, saw the shield with the gems glittering in it, then, with a cry to my companionthat the torch was going out, I droppedit as it singed my fingers. What happened then?" Kwembi asked, rising from his seat and covering his eyes, as if to shut out some scene which again rose before him.

"What happened, you ask? I saw the face of the mummy thrust into mine; we fell together, and two sets of bony fingers gripped me by the throat! I could not cry out; for a minute my senses reeled with the horror of the thing, then I caught my weird assailant in turn, and we fought together upon the floor of the vault in the blind darkness, no sound from our lips escaping as we struggled for the mastery. At last I shook myself free, ran headlong to the foot of the shaft, wound the rope about my waist, and shouted to the fellahs to drag me up!

"No sooner did the men see my scared face and the marks of that fearful struggle which I bore, than they basely fled in terror; nor did I once after see them again. Suddenly a thought occurred to me— my companion ! In securing my own safety I had forgotten him! I threw myself flat upon the ground and cried out to him, as I tried to pierce the gloom at the bottom of the shaft. No answer reached me— none ! I called out again and again, but heard only the echo of my own voice ringing in the depths of the vault. Sick with horror, I ran from the place and wandered aimlessly about, but whether for days or weeks I cannot tell. I next remember waking, as if from a dream, to find a native woman bending over me, by whom I had been found, it appears, in a cave, such as there are in plenty in the land over which I rule. By chance she had discovered me there, and, so long, had been able to save me from the men of her tribe by keeping my presence unknown to them. When my strength was sufficiently restored, she urged me to return the way I came, but I refused. The dreadful event which had happened so completely unhinged my mind that I had no wish to live. In spite of her entreaties, I made my way to where the huts of her tribe were, and was promptly seized by two braves, who dragged me before the chief. For some time his tribe had been at war with another, and even as I stood before Haika in this palace a messenger came in saying that the chiefs braves were being driven in.

"More with the object of flinging away my life than any other, I promised Haika if he would spare me I would fight for him against the invading tribe. So often had he been tricked by Arab traders that he refused, but at last gave a reluctant consent. All that afternoon his vanquished braves came hurrying in, telling of the numbers slain in the recent battle. By means of the chief's headman— who, from frequent intercourse with Arab traders, managed to interpret my words— I volunteered to head a division of the braves if they were intrusted to me. Accordingly, when Haika drew up his men to defend his palace and the huts of the great village, I selected a number of them and led them away. The chief presented me with a rifle, which proved more serviceable than I expected; while a fortunate downpour of rain, which occurred that night, was considered a good omen. The natives persuaded themselves that the white man was lucky!

"About two hours before dawn the enemy made the attack, Haika's braves resisting stoutly. Having made a wide detour with the men I led, we took the foes in the rear— before the sun had risen the enemy fled panicstricken, and Haika's braves had won! Both sides suffered severely, as the blent heaps of the dying and dead plainly showed. Seeing a throng of braves gathered round one of the wounded, I pressed through them to find Haika lying there, clutching in his stiffening fingers his bloody spear. He seemed to recognise me; as I bent over him he feebly raised himself a little, motioned to me to take his weapon, and then fell back dead.

" 'The chief has chosen the white man in his place!' the braves cried, and that day, on the field of battle, I was made chief of this tribe over which I now rule, and from which I would not go, for they are faithful to me, and I accept the strange fortune which is mine. She who found me in the cave has become my bride, while, so efficient in war are my braves now, that the power of five tribes dwelling about my territory has been completely broken. The Arab traders have several times endeavoured to get my consent to pass through this territory, for, somehow, the secret of that strange tomb has become known to them, although they do not know the exact position of the place concerning which they have put many unanswered questions to me. As to the shield, I dare not enter the tomb again in search of it; what I think about the nameless prince whose fingers wound themselves about my throat I can only. hint. You look incredulous, but remember that the parchment declares he was not slain when thrust into the sarcophagus."

"You surely don't wish to persuade us that he has lived in that tomb since the time of Menes?" asked Denviers. "Our Arab guide, Hassan, as I have said, can spin a tolerably tall yarn at times, but yours—" and he laughed irreverently as he rose from the chief's side at the close of the story.

"In my opinion," Kwembi returned, "much of the mysterious lore of Ancient Egypt has been lost ; who knows under what conditions the prince may have been immured there? As to whether the struggle of which I speak took place or not, let these marks testify." The chief unfastened the garment about his neck and showed several large lateral scars, then he added:—

"Now will you agree to my conditions? You accepted the ring of Menes; if you will swear to me to recover this shield which

is mine by right of discovery, I will send a body of braves to join your followers. When you get possession of it you can send it back to me — on these terms you may continue your journey, otherwise you must turn back—"

"And if we fail to find the tomb?" Denviers interrupted.

"That will not happen; I will give you an exact description of its position," and Kwembi proceeded to do so.

"We will start at sunrise to-morrow," Denviers agreed, when everything was satisfactorily settled, and we were then conducted to a hut prepared for us, where we sat smoking and talking together till the night was advanced, Hassan and Kass seeing to the comfort of our followers.

When morning came we set out on our march, headed by the braves whom Kwembi appointed to go with us. At the end of the second week after leaving the chief's palace, we found ourselves at last within a short distance of the tomb. Leaving the encampment we had made, Denviers and I went forward, accompanied by Hassan and Kass with two of Kwembi's braves, who were to carry the shield if it were discovered.

iii

OFTEN as Denviers had discussed the subject with me, neither of us had conjectured rightly what the end of our adventure would be— so completely did it take us by surprise. After making our way along a narrow path which wound up the precipitous, gloomy cliffs at the foot of which the White Nile flowed, we came to a narrow entry and, stooping down, we passed within. Hassan led the way holding a torch; following him, we found ourselves in a grotto, the roof of which rose high above our heads.

"The entry to the tomb, sahibs," the Arab cried, as we stood by his side and glanced at the fantastic shapes of the jagged projections from walls and roof. Denviers lit another torch, and, handing his rifle to Kass, motioned to Hassan to go on. The Arab cautiously advanced. After traversing a few yards he stopped.

"See! The way lies here," he exclaimed, pointing down a gloomy shaft, and without delay we descended, Kass remaining behind with the two natives, who lowered us in turn into the vault of which Kwembi had spoken.

We soon discovered that we were in no hastily prepared excavation. Pillars of granite supported the roof, sculptured with many a strange design. The walls upon which the flickering torchlight fell were painted— here, the half-obliterated face of a sphinx, inscrutable and stolid, looked away from the hands of suppliants held appealingly towards it there, a great procession was limned, the central figure being a man, probably the prince, led into captivity or to death. At times a fallen pillar obstructed our way as on we passed, till we had gone fifty paces or more and the opposing wall was reached. Examining the latter as carefully as we had done the first, we saw no indication of a break in it such as we were led to expect. Slowly we turned and walked close to the third side.

"I hope the main object of our expedition is not doomed to disappointment," Denviers remarked. "Strange as this place is, it seems to me very likely—" He stopped suddenly, for Hassan, who was a few yards ahead, was seen to stoop down as if examining something upon the rocky floor.

"The sahibs' slave has found what they seek," he cried, and quickly we hastened to the spot. An excavation, rising to the height of seven feet, had been made in the wall, the material taken from which lay in a confused heap close by. Nor was that all we saw. An ancient sarcophagus, broken, lay in shattered fragments, mingled with pieces of decayed wood, once forming the inner casing of the mummy, flung down when the lid was wrenched off by Kwembi's companion.

Yellow as parchment, yet wonderfully preserved from the ravages of time, the mummy was; if cloths had once swathed it, none were there then, save the rotting fillet about its forehead ; a strange glitter came from its face, for the latter had been gilded; its tangled hair was thick with dust. I touched the band near me; it came off with part of the arm as my fingers closed upon it. Holding it near Denviers's torch, as we glanced curiously at it, a spark fell, and in a moment the hand and arm burnt away, filling the air with an odour of bitumen, and leaving a mere pinch of ashes behind.

"The shield," I whispered to Denviers, awed by the strange surroundings of our adventure; but, search as we did, we could not find it. Finally, we determined to examine the whole vault systematically, Denviers and I beginning from one of its oblong sides, Hassan from the other. The Arab's torch was visible to us for some minutes; then it disappeared, as we heard a cry from his lips to Allah and Mahomet.

We hastily passed across to the fourth side of the vault, where we found another excavation leading upwards, and in front of us we saw Hassan hurrying on with his torch held above his head. A ray of light soon lit the excavation from without; a minute after we had emerged upon the path which led to the tomb, but higher than we had previously gone. We heard a crash as of something striking the rock below, then . again Hassan's excited cries rang upon our ears. We looked up and saw the Arab struggling upon a narrow shelve of rock with an opponent, whose matted hair and beard seemed as ragged as the vestiges of clothing upon his half-naked body. Swaying to and fro upon the giddy height, they clung to each other, fighting each for his life and the other's death. Each laboured to get his foe's back to the threatening void: we saw Hassan forced into that position, heard a fierce cry from his opponent, then, just as the Arab seemed to totter on the verge of the precipitous cliff, he swung himself round and thrust his foe headlong below! How it was done we never rightly understood, but as he fell the man caught at a projecting ledge, clung to it for one brief second, drew himself up with his hands, and with a mad cry ran into one of the orifices which honeycombed the cliff.

Long as we sought for him we could not find the man; whether he was Kwembi's companion, and in the blind darkness had unknowingly fought with him, mistaking his comrade's clasp for that of the crumbling mummy, was more than we had an opportunity of discovering, although our conjecture was such. There was the excavation from the tomb into the open air— easily made in the soft rock with the implement of which Kwembi had spoken— to support our view, and the fact that the mind of one at least of the explorers had been shaken by that weird, mutual mistake

"Sahibs," cried Hassan, making his way towards where we stood, forming hasty conjectures as to what had happened, "the Great Prophet guided Hassan's feet to enter the excavation. There he discovered one who barred his way, holding in his grasp the strange shield. When their Arab slave thrust his torch into the foe's face he turned and fled. Finding himself pursued, the man ran out upon the ledge of rock and flung this strange shield far below, then grappled with the dust of the sahibs' feet."

"Well, Hassan," said Denviers, as the Arab afterwards assisted us to secure the shield, which had, however, been dinted slightly in the fall, "the dust of the sahibs' feet, as you call yourself, had a narrow escape from being dashed to pieces,"

"Allah and Mahomet preserved Hassan," our Arab gravely responded, as we fastened the shield to a spear, and placed the ends of the latter upon the shoulders of two of Kwembi's men, and bade them carry it to where our encampment was. "Surely it is his Kismet to be saved that he may serve the Englishmen and tell them from time to time of the wise sayings of the Great Prophet."

"We both hope so, at all events," Denviers replied, with a smile. " Kwembi shall hear of your share in recovering the treasure he first discovered ; and when we are resting in our tent this evening you shall read us some more out of the Koran, or tell us a story."

"For Hassan to hear is for him to obey," said the Arab, with a profound obeisance, and we started for our encampment. To Kwembi we dispatched the shield, guarded by the natives, next day, while we set out once more upon our journey.

_____________________

5: Lady Florry's Gems

George Manville Fenn

1831–1909

Strand Magazine, April 1892

CREAK! crawk! And then thud! splish! splash! and a horrible echoing, whispering sound, as the water drawn up by the two men at the winch rose some ten feet higher, where each bucket in turn was caught by a check and reversed, to pour its contents into a huge cistern to supply the drinking water at the Castle.

I, Charles Lester, had climbed the down after my early morning visit to the sea beneath the cliffs, where a plunge down into the clear depths had sent an electric thrill through me. There I had swum and dived for ten minutes, dressed in the warm sunshine, and tramped back over the cliff slope where Lord Gurtleigh's flock of Southdowns were nibbling the short dewy herbage and giving their mutton a gamey flavour by crunching up the thousands of tiny snail-shells as well.

I was satisfied with the look of the flock, laughed to myself as I thought what a farmer, bailiff, and general man of business I was growing in dear old Dick's interest, and had then gone round so as to pass through the gardens and let the men see I was abovit.

"I know they'll call me a nigger driver," I said to myself, "but they've all had too easy a time of it during Dick's minority, and things have been shamefully neglected."

And then I mused on my plans respecting the management of the estate as I went back to the Castle, making up my mind that as Gurtleigh had placed everything in my hands, I would have none but good men about the place. Everything should be honest and above board ; and so it fell out that I was walking back to my room, through the yard, at seven o'clock that bright summer morning, meaning to do a couple of hours' writing and account reading, when I heard the squealing and creaking of the wheel in the well-house with its high-pitched roof.

I turned sharply, entering the great stone-paved, wet place, where a man was grinding away on either side of the opening, and came plump— that's the correct word, and his appearance justified it— upon Brayson, the butler, standing there, slowly sipping a tumbler of water, and looking as clean-shaven and smooth as if he were by the sideboard in the dining-room, waiting at one of the meals.

"Good morning, sir."

"Morning, Brayson. Stop! Look here, my men, why, in heaven's name, don't you grease that wheel?"

The men ceased turning, and the one nearest touched his forehead.

"Be no good, sir. Her squeal again dreckerly, all on account o' the water."

"Then, grease it again, or oil it, or something!"

"Never have been greased," said the man on the other side, slowly, and in a way which seemed to say "What business is it of yours?"

"Then let it be done before to-morrow morning," I said sharply. "The whole of the machine is eaten up with rust. Where's your common sense, men? Why, your work will be as easy again. — Do you do this often, Brayson?" I said.

"Every morning, sir," he replied obsequiously. "Winter and summer, I always have a glass of this water first thing. Finest drink in the world for your health. Will you try a glass, sir?"

"Well— yes."

Before I had finished speaking, he was rinsing the tumbler in a freshly filled tub; then, taking a clean napkin from his pocket, he wiped and polished it, finally, as one of the buckets rose out of the black, vaporous depths of the opening enclosed by the framework of the winch, he signed to the men to stop, and dipped the glass full, holding it for a few minutes in the open doorway, while a frosty dew rapidly formed on the outside of the tumbler.

"There, sir," he said solemnly, and he handed it to me as if it were a glass of his lordship's choicest champagne.

I took the glass and drank its contents.

"Capital water, Brayson."

"Finest glass in the country, sir."

"And nice and cool."

"Always the same, sir, winter or summer. Comes from so deep down. It's just a hundred feet."

"Now, after the dry weather?"

"Never alters, sir; just keeps to the same height, and there's about eighty foot of water down there; never-failing supply."

"Humph ; cut right down the solid chalk," I said, as I gazed into the black depths of the huge shaft, which was about ten feet in diameter, and breathed the cool, damp air which rose.

"Yes, sir, and she's never foul," said the man nearest to me. " I've been down when they mended the bottom wheel. Can't do that at Sir Romney's place; two men choked there only last year."

"Year afore," growled the other man.

"Oh, weer it? So it weer."

Then the winding ivent on as I peered lown into the gloomy place, listening to the dull, heavy plunge of the buckets as they reached the water, and then to the echoing, splashing, and hollow musical sound as the water streamed and dripped back when they rose.

"Clumsy arrangement," I said, as I turned away with a shudder; for the place was creepy and terrible and strange. "There ought to be a force-pump turned by a pony or a donkey, as at Carisbrooke. Oh! by the way, Brayson," I continued, as I was crossing the yard toward the gates, "I want to go over the wine-cellar."

"The wine-cellar, sir?" he said, and his fat face changed colour.

"Yes, to take stock. His lordship talks of laying down a fresh supply. Have your cellar book ready, and we'll begin at once."

There was a slight dew on the man's face, or I fancied there was, and I said to myself, as I went round to the front:  "Master Brayson has been helping himself to a few bottles of port, and I've got to find him out. Deuced unpleasant, all this running tilt at the servants ; I wish I had gone on reading for the law."

ii

AFTER BREAKFAST I rang for Brayson, and began my inspection of the wine-cellar.

That took up the greater part of four days. Result: I had Brayson into the little library which was given up to me as my office, Lord Gurtleigh having merely reserved to himself the right to come of an evening and smoke a pipe.

Brayson came in looking very pale and sodden. In those four days he had lost flesh; and, as he stood before me, the miserable wretch perspired profusely and was trembling.

"Now, look here, Brayson," I said gravely, "you are aware that Lord Gurtleigh has placed everything in my hands."

"Yes, sir, his lordship told me so."

"Exactly. Well, I am very sorry to have to exercise my prerogative so soon; but I must make an example. You were in the late Lord Gurtleigh's service fifteen years, and for the past seven years you have had sole charge of that valuable cellar of wine which has been shamefully plundered. What have you to say?"

His lips moved, but no words came.

"Nothing? Well, I have a little to say. Give me your keys. I shall have the plate examined at once. His lordship will be extremely loth to have you prosecuted, but you must leave here; and I can only say, how could you be so mad as to throw away so good a post?"

"Oh, for God's sake forgive me, sir! " he cried passionately, and crying now like a child. "I'll confess everything, sir. The plate is all right, sir— I swear it is, sir; but I did take a little wine.

"A little, man! hundreds of dozens are missing."

"Yes, sir, it's true, sir; but have mercy on me, sir. I'll turn over a new leaf, sir, and be the best servant his lordship could have, sir. I did sell some wine, sir; I was tempted, sir. No one ever wanted to know about it before in all these years."

"And now the day of reckoning has come."

"Yes, sir; but I will mind, sir. For Heaven's sake forgive me, sir. I've a wife and family, sir; and it's ruin to me. You know it is. I can never get another place with a character like that. I'll be the best of servants, sir. I'll be your slave, sir, and I'll confess everything, sir, and show you what's been going on in the stables, and at the farm, and in the garden, and about the hares and fezzans, sir."

"I can find out for myself," I said, sternly; "and Lord Gurtleigh wants an honest butler, not a contemptible tale-bearing spy."

"Of course, sir; of course. But, Mr. Lester, sir, have mercy on me, sir. Indeed I'll turn over a new leaf."

"Then go and turn it over, man, and don't grovel before me in that way. Let me see that you do repent. But, mind this, if the slightest act of dishonesty comes to my ken, there will be no more mercy."

"God bless you, sir ; thank you, sir," he sobbed out. "I—, I—"

He could say no more ; but broke down, and stood with his face working.

"Sit down, Brayson, till you are more composed," I said, quietly. "There is cold water in that carafe; take some. Don't let the servants see you in this condition."

"Thank you, sir, thank you," he whispered hoarsely, and the glass tapped against the bottle as he poured out: some water and drank it.

"Weak, drinks more than is good for him— excepting the cold water from the well every morning to steady his nerves," I said to myself as soon as Brayson had gone. "Well, I hope he will turn out right, and that I have made a friend."

iii

THE MONTHS glided on, and after a great deal of anxiety I could honestly feel that I was gettmg Gurtleigh's little kingdom into a fair state, when one night we had a shock. I was in the little library, poring over some papers sent down by his lordship's solicitor, about which a reply was needed. I had been speaking to Dick about it over our coffee, and he had Veplied, "Well, you know best Don't bother me ! Go and get it done, and then we'll have a quiet cigar. I'll join you in an hour."

He joined me in half that time, dashing into the library excitedly.

"Charley, old man ! " he cried. " Quick, there's something wrong!"

"What!" I cried as excitedly. "Lady Florry—"

"Yes," he panted, "went up to her dressing-room. The door was locked. There must be—"

"Burglars!" I cried. "Quick, call the servants! Go up and guard that door, and send someone round to me!"

"Where are you going?"

"Under your windows," I cried, throwing open the one at the end of the room; and, springing out, I ran round to the front of the house, fully expecting to see one of the farm ladders reared up against the broad stone balcony which ran along the first floor. There it was, in the dim light, which was sufficiently strong for me to see that the window was open.

I did not hesitate a moment. "Burglars are always cowards," I reasoned, and I ran up the ladder and dashed to the window, thinking, though, that I should be awkwardly situated if our visitors had revolvers.

But no shot welcomed me as I stepped in, took a little match-box from my pocket, struck a light, and held it above my head. Nothing to be seen, so I stepped forward, lit the candles on the toilette-table, and peered about.

"Hullo!" cried a voice behind me, and Lord Gurtleigh sprang into the room. "Anyone there?"

"No," I said, "we are too late."

A minute's search proved that I was right, and then we turned to the door, which was carefully bolted on the inside; and, as we threw it open, there stood Brayson, the footman, and a couple of grooms, while voices behind us told that help was ready below, the gardeners and stablemen having been called up.

"Mind!" I shouted, running to the window, "keep back on the grass ; there may be footprints there — I shall want to examine."

Then I stood thinking for a moment before issuing my orders as promptly as I could, sending grooms off mounted to summon the police, and then ride on to the railway station, and ask for help to detain any suspicious-looking people; while the gardeners went to scour the grounds and rouse the keepers, watchers, and people at the nearest farms.

It all proved labour in vain, and towards morning I sat fagged out— after despatching a telegram to the county town and another to London— talking to Lord and Lady Gurtleigh.

"I wouldn't care twopence," said the former, " but they've got jewels that are priceless. All poor Florry's pearls, which came from the Guicowar of Badjar Aman, and the old family diamonds."

"Don't fret, Dick, dear," said Lady Gurtleigh, quietly; "it's a great pity, but I will not mind. I daresay Charles Lester will get them back for me."

"Bless your faith," I cried, unable to repress a smile, in spite of my chagrin; "what a wonderful man you two think I am!"

"Well," said my old college chum, givdng the table a rap with his fist, "wonderful or no, I do say this, if anyone can get them back it's dear old Charley here."

"Indeed!" I said, "then my dear Lady Florry, try and be resigned, for your jewels are gone for ever, unless the detectives can run the scoundrels down."

"What, have you sent for the detectives?" cried Gurtleigh.

"Of course."

"How delightful,'' cried Lady Gurtleigh, clapping her hands, "it will be like reading a romance."

"Humph!" ejaculated Gurtleigh, "she's not going to break her heart about the jewels."

"I should think not, indeed, dear," she cried, merrily. "They haven't killed us to get the nasty things. There now, you two poor tired creatures are to smoke a cigar each, and I'll ring for some coffee."

She rang, and Brayson appeared looking sadly troubled and bearing a tray.

"I took the liberty, my lady," he began.

"Oh, Brayson, how good of you!"

"Yes," said Lord Gurtleigh; "but, I say Brayson; you should have brought the brandy too."

"I did, my lord, I have it outside here on a tray."

"All your doing, Charley," said Gurtleigh as soon as we were alone, "that chap's getting quite a moral, as they say down here. Here's to you, dear boy, and I hope Florry is right.''

The police were soon on the spot, and at once created a revolution among the servants, who threatened to leave in a body on finding that they were suspected. The upper-housemaid being particularly demonstrative and full of angry demands that the police sergeant should search her box.

But they did not trace the thieves, neither did they make any discoveries through the pawnbrokers or diamond merchants, and the months rolled on, and it was summer once again.

"It isn't your fault, old man," Gurtleigh said to me one day when they were down at the Castle again, after spending the winter in Italy, "and, look here, I taboo the topic. Whenever we meet, you begin going on about those confounded jewels. I don't mind now, and Florry doesn't mind, so let them rest. Anyone would think they were yours, you make so much fuss."

But I could only think about those lost stones, and Lady Gurtleigh's words that if they were found it would be by me. How I had pondered over their loss, and suspected different people, but only to feel guilty afterwards of misjudging them. For again and again I had felt convinced that the theft had been committed by someone who knew the place and our habits ; hence I argued that it must have been one of the out-door servants— groom, gardener, farm labourer, or perhaps even a keeper. I grew more convinced of this as time glided by; for it seemed to me that those jewels must be buried or hidden somewhere, with the thief waiting his time till he could find an opportunity for disposing of them safely. I don't know how it was, but the gardener excited most of my suspicion, and I used to go about the grounds at all hours pondering upon likely places where they could have been buried— under newly planted trees, in vineries, under forcing frames, in pots or tubs in the conservatories. Then the labourers, the men who could be handy with ladders, had their turn in my suspicions, and, with my monomania increasing, I wandered about haystacks and farm buildings, peered under thatches and eaves, and pondered over the tiles and stones of floors.

"Those jewels never reached London!" I used to declare to myself as I wandered about with my walking-stick (one made of steel, heavily varnished, and so sharp at the point that I could use it as a probe to thrust into the ground amongst roots, or into stacks or thatches, in the hope of discovering the hidden gems). There were times when I told myself it was all imagination, especially when I Avas wearied out and felt that I had searched everywhere, and one night I thought that I would follow Lord Gurtleigh's advice, and give the matter up.

Result: I woke the next morning, and went down to the sea for my plunge in the deep hole beneath the cliffs determined to proceed, and with a peculiar belief that sooner or later I should find those gems.

iv

A GREAT change had resulted from my management, I must own. The people about the place had found out that I was not to be trifled with, and it was quite cheering to find how they settled down to the work. But I did not relax my vigilance. I was out early every morning and about the place, fine weather or foul, and for months past I had encountered smiles where there used to be scowls. One bright June morning I descended the cliff and reached the great chalk rock, where I undressed, stood for a few moments with the early sunshine full upon me and reflected from the high cliff, as I gazed down into the dark depths of the clear water before making my dive. Then I leaped right out, parted the cool, bracing fluid, and dived right down to see how long I could stay below before rising again, and repeating the performance, feeling for the moment what an excellent diver I was, and directly after how feeble my efforts were as compared with those of a seal.

"I ought to have gone right to the bottom," I said to myself, as I was dressing; "who knows but what the jewels may have been thrown in there. Not a bad hiding-place," I mused, "but no, not likely."

I walked back sharply, and, as of old, the rushing and splash in the well-house saluted me as I crossed the yard, thinking that if it had not been for my old friend's heavy loss I should have persuaded him to let me design new machinery for raising the water supply.

Brayson's words had so impressed me that it had grown into a habit to take my glass of cold water after my bath, and one was kept on a shelf on purpose for my use, one of the men thrusting in the winch-stop when a bucket was level, and filling the glass as a matter of course as soon as I was seen crossing the yard.

That morning, as I stood in the well-house, sipping the clear, cold fluid, and listening to the trickling and echoing splashing of the falling water, I gave quite a start, and involuntarily peered down into the horrible -looking black hole.

The next minute I had tossed off the remains of my draught, and hurried away, trembling lest my excitement should have been noted by the men; for, like an inspiration, the thought had come to me, " The jewels are hidden down there!"

Instead of turning into the gardens, as I generally did, I hurried in, and up to my own room, to finish dressing, but with my cheeks burning and temples throbbing, calling myself fool, madman; telling myself that it was impossible, improbable to a degree; that there were a million more likely places for the jewels to have been hidden, and that to throw them down there was to cast them away for ever.

But all these arguments were vain against the hourly growing feeling that I had at last hit upon the spot where the stolen gems were hidden.

Why had I not thought of that place before? I don't know. Perhaps it was too simple, perhaps too impossible. Suffice it, I never had till now, and the idea had suddenly become a fever, which Avent on increasing for quite a week, when, unable to combat the feeling longer, I gave way.

"There must be something in it," I said to myself, "or I should not be haunted in this fashion. Superstition? Perhaps ; but whether it is that, or madness, or folly, I shall never rest till I have searched that well."

As soon as I had made up my mind to this, my first thought was to consult Lord Gurtleigh, but I cast that out at once.

"He'll ridicule it," I said, "I can't make him feel as I do;" and, although I would have gladly given anything for a confidant, I felt that I must act alone, and keep my actions hidden— no easy task— from everyone about the place.

It was like a fit of insanity, quite a monomania ; but I was determined, and from that hour began to think out my plans.

The simplest thing would have been to empty the well ; but that was impossible. No amount of drawing water had the slightest effect, for the diggers had tapped the huge reservoirs extending beneath the mighty chalk range running east and west of the vast spur upon which the castle stood dominating the sea. There could be no draining the well, and, even had it been possible, I should not have felt disposed to propose such a thing; for I wanted to keep my actions secret in case it was all a fancy engendered by the sight of the place.

That night, with a feeling of certainty that I had as good as found the jewels which had been hidden there for the reasons I had already settled, I made my way to the well-house after everyone had retired for the night.

I had provided myself with a lantern, matches, and a reel, upon which were a hundred yards of salmon line from Lord Gurtleigh's tackle, and, lastly, a heavy plummet, beneath which I hung a little grapnel formed of hooks securely bound back to back.

The place looked very grim and repellent as I carefully closed the doors. All was silent and black, and when a drop of water dripped from the great cistern overhead it fell with a splash far below, which echoed from the slimy sides of the well in a peculiar way that was almost s:artling. But I was too hot upon my project, and, carefully lighting my lantern in one corner, I tried to keep it covered, over till I had attached the end of the line to the lantern-ring, and swung it down over the side into the well.

"Nobody is likely to be watching the place," I thought, as I lowered the light for ten or a dozen feet; and then, as I looked over the rail, I began to search for what I expected to find, to wit, a string attached somewhere to the side— a string that I had settled in my own mind would be attached to the packet lowered down.

But I walked slowly round, examining carefully, and specially about the massive oaken cross beams which supported the bucket wheel, and there was no result. I could see nothing but the stout rope, which rose up from the darkness, passed over the wheel by the cistern, and went down again into the black depths— two ropes, as it were, three feet apart, about the centre of the great shaft, nothing more.

I drew the lantern a little higher, then lowered it ; and again more and more, but there was no string, and, bitterly disappointed, I let the light go down and down, stopping several times, and listening, in fear lest the clicking made by the salmon winch might draw attention to my task; and at last the echoing sound seemed so loud that I twisted the line about the railing, and stole to the door and listened.

All was still, and I went back to peer down at the lantern swinging softly to and fro fully fifty feet down. And now, after loosening the line, I let it run out with the lantern descending, past the buckets, till I caught a faint gleam just beneath it, and then I could just see part of a wheel standing out of the black water, the beams which held it being beneath the surface, the light burning clearly and showing that there was no foul air.

As I rapidly wound the lantern up, I saw once more the two buckets about halfway down. Then, as I went on winding, they seemed to be descending, but of course it was the lantern coming up, and directly after I had it in my hand, vmtied it, and attached my grapnel. This I held over the well, and the weight ran it out rapidly. I heard it strike the water, and then on and on it went to what seemed to be a tremendous depth, before it touched bottom.

Then I began to drag here and there, pulling it in all directions, expecting every moment to feel a check, and when at last I did, my heart seemed to leap ; but, as I lifted, it was only to find that a hook had caught against the bottom.

I kept this up for about a couple of hours, passing from one side of the draw wheels to ihe other after hauling up ; but my efforts were in vain. I hooked nothing, and at last, in despair at my ill-success, I wound up, meaning to put the work off for another night, when all at once there was a sharp check, which nearly snatched the wheel out of my hand, and I knew that I had caught against one of the cross-beams that supported the lower wheel beneath the water. After a great deal of snatching and tugging the line was free, but at the expense of many yards left below, and my plummet and grapnel left sticking in the beam.

"Enough for to-night," I said to myself, opening my lantern and blowing out the candle.

Then throwing back the doors, I stood listening, fancying I had heard a step, but all was silent, and I crossed the yard, let myself in, and went to bed, but not to sleep. For I lay tossing from side to side, more convinced than ever that the jewels lay at the bottom of that well.

Why? I don't know: I only tell you what I thought, and, though I had dragged so unsuccessfully, and felt that I was not likely to recover them in that very primitive way, feeling as I did that the beams would prevent me from thoroughly searching the bottom, I was more determined than ever, and by sunrise had made up my mind what to do.

v

I ROSE that morning an hour earlier than usual, and went down for my customary bathe.

As I reached the shore I searched about till I had found a couple of chalk boulders to my taste, and carried these to the top of the rock off which I regularly made my plunge, and laid them there.

"An Englishman ought to be as clever as a nigger," I said as I undressed, and I stooped and picked up one of the stones and gazed down into the deep water. "Seems a mad thing to do," I muttered; and then, feeling that if I hesitated I should fail, I took my leap, struck the water with a tremendous splash, and then went down like an arrow, lower and lower till quite in dismay I unclasped my hands from the stone and rose rapidly to the surface. "It's easy enough," I thought, as my head shot into the sunshine; and, climbing back, I took the other stone, contriving to glide off from close to the surface with the weight nipped between my knees.

This time I went down feet first till the water began to grow dark, when the stone slipped, and I again shot up, rather breathless, but encouraged by my success. I tried that experiment for half a dozen times more and continued it for a week, morning after morning, providing myself now with short lengths of line to tie round the stones to form a handle, and practising till I could seize a stone, plunge in with it, and let it drag me rapidly to the bottom, where I loosened my grasp after trying how long I could stay; and towards the last, after finding that I could easily stay down a minute, I always rose with some small stones or a handful of pebbles from the bottom.

"I can go East and turn pearl diver now," I said, "if everything else fails;" and, quite satisfied with the confidence acquired by my skill in diving, I prepared one night for a venture which rather chilled me as the time approached.

It was a mad plan, and I knew it. I felt that I was quite a monomaniac ; but I was blindly determined, and one night found me, lantern-armed, and provided with matches, shut up in the well-house.

I had stolen out about one, with every nerve strung to the highest pitch, and a horrible feeling of dread sending a shiver through me ; but I honestly believe that, if at that moment the danger of my task had been twice as great, the bull-dog obstinacy within me would have carried me through.

But the danger was great enough, I well knew, as I set down on the humid floor the load I had brought, and then lit the lantern, and placed it on the framework of the great winch. Then lighting a piece of wax candle, I fixed that on the other side of the well by letting a little of the wax drip on the stout rail.

"So far so good," I said to myself, as I resolutely drove back horrible suggestions, set my teeth, and threw off the ulster I wore, to stand ready in an old football jersey and drawers.

I had thought out my plans to the smallest minutiae, and made all my calculations ; so that, feeling that my only chance for carrying out my task successfully was by going straight on without hesitation, I raised the load I had brought one by one— a couple of fifty-six pound weights, and after seeing that the stop was in the winch, in one of the buckets up level with the rail. Then, fastening a string to the lantern, I lowered it down till it was about five feet from the water, fastened the string, and taking out the stop, let the first bucket run down with the weights till I heard it kiss the water with a hollow, echoing splash. As the sound arose I thrust the stop into the cogs of the winch once more, and the bucket was stopped, as I could see, half in the water.

The next task was perilous, but nothing I felt to what was to come, as, mounting the rail, and climbing out on the apparatus, I seized one rope, reached out, caught the other, twisted my leg round, hung for a moment over the shaft, which looked, if anything, more horrible from the dim light below, and let myself glide rapidly down.

It was the task of a very few moments, but long enough for me to be attacked by thoughts such as — suppose the rope broke— suppose the air was foul down below— suppose I could not get back to the surface— answers to which came at once, for I knew that the rope would bear double my weight; that the lantern would not have burned in foul air; and that as to returning, I had but placed them ready which I had drawn to stand in the bucket when I reached it, and draw myself up by hauling the other rope.

No— impossible ; I had fixed the machinery with the stop. The thought unnerved me for the moment, and then I laughed, as I recalled how often I had climbed a rope. Then I was level with the swinging lantern, my feet touched the water close by the partly-submerged lower wheel, and I checked myself to feel about and find, as I had anticipated, a broad resting-place, just below the surface, composed of slippery cross-beams.

Here I stopped for a few moments thinking— not hesitating— as to which side I should .descend. And now, in spite of the dogged courage within me, I felt in full force the terrible risk I was about to run. It was one thing to plunge down into the open sea in broad daylight, holding one of those boulders ; another to take a fifty-six pound Aveight from that bucket close by me, plant it by me on the beam, thrust my foot through the ring right up to my instep, and then lower myself off and let that weight drag me down into those horrible cold, black depths.

I shuddered with the shock of dread which ran through me, and then snapping my teeth together like an angry dog, I uttered a low laugh, which startled me again, as in my desperate fit I said—

"Bah, what a poor soldier I should have made! Common workmen go through such risks every day as a matter of course. The jewels or—"

I did not finish my sentence, but bent down as I held on by the rope, and took one of the weights out of the bucket close by me; the water Avashing about and whishing against the slimy walls as if it were swarming with live creatures, disturbed by my coming, and ascending rapidly from the depths to attack the intruder upon their home.

My foot glided along over the oaken beam on which I stood, but I held on by the rope and recovered myself, planted the weight down in the water by my feet, and holding up the ring thrust my right foot through close up to the instep.

"That will do," I thought, as I raised my toes, feeling that if I descended carefully it could not slip off till I lowered the fore part of my foot. " Now, lad, no silly fancies," I muttered. " A few long breaths, then one deep inhalation; down you go rapidly; then feel about for a minute and a half, find the package, slip your foot out of the ring— no, you will be holding it then— keep your hands over your head in case you come up under the beam, and then hurrah for to-morrow."

It was a childish way of addressing myself, perhaps ; but I felt bound to treat the matter lightly, so as to cloak the peril from my too active brain. "Ready?" I said, as I kept on breathing slowly and deeply, preparatory to taking the long, deep, lasting breath.

"Yes," I said, mentally, and changing my hold to the other rope, I was about to lower myself into a sitting position on the beam, drawing that deep, breath the while, when like lightning came the thought— "Suppose it is your last!" for a thrill shot down my left arm right to my heart, and I sprang back to my erect position wondering as the thrill went on.

Were my muscles quivering like that? No; it was the rope which I held in my hand, literally throbbing. I looked up, and there far above me, dimly visible by the light of the candle I had left burning, I could see something dark reaching out from the woodwork to the rope. The throbbing went on violently, and before I could grasp what it meant, the rope gave way in my hand, there was a peculiar rushing in the water, I lost my balance, my foot in the iron ring felt as if snatched off the slippery beam, and I was rushing down through the black water rapidly toward the bottom.

vi

I SUPPOSE I must have struck out involuntarily, and in the act, as the water thundered in my ears and literally jarred me as if blows had been struck over my head, the weight glided from my foot and I rose to the surface choking, panting, and grasping wildly at the first object I touched. It was rope, and it gave way beneath my grasp. I caught at something again. It was a wheel and it turned round, but, as strange sounds, shouts, and cries reached my ears, I got hold of the cross beam, and somehow, by help of the wheel, managed to reach my old position, but crouching down and holding on for dear life.

"Below there!" shouted a familiar voice, but hollow and strange, "who is it?"

"I! Help! Help!" I gasped, now thoroughly unnerved.

"Right ; can you hold on till we send you down a rope?"

I did not answer for a few moments as I strove to realise my chances.

"Yes," I said hoarsely. "Don't be long."

It seemed an age before the rope came, and during the terrible waiting time I listened to words of encouragement mingled with stern orders delivered in Lord Gurtleigh's voice.

Then came a cheer, and he shouted to me —

"Hold on, lad! Rope's being rigged over the wheel. I'm coming down."

"No, no," I shouted, rousing myself now from the apathy into which I had been fast sinking. "Send it down, and I'll make it fast."

Soon after a lantern began to descend, and by its light I saw the loop of a rope gradually glide lower and lower till it reached me, when I was so numbed and cramped that I had hard work to get it over my head and arms. But I succeeded, and it must have spun round and tightened about my chest as I was hoisted up, for I was quite unable to help myself, and insensible by the time I reached the top.

When I opened my eyes again with an understanding brain, my old friend was seated by my bedside; and, after I had assured him that I was not going to die, he told me that he had been roused up by the head keeper throwing shots at his window; and, upon his opening it, the man told him that there was something wrong, for, passing near the back of the buildings, he had seen a light in the well -house through the little window.

"We were only just in time, Charley. Caught the scoundrel with the knife in his hand. He had just cut through the rope."

"Who— who was it?" I cried.

"Why, Brayson, of course!"

"Then he was the thief!" I cried, excitedly, "and the jewels are there."

"Jewels? Down the well? You were after them!"

"Of course," I said, and I told him all.

"Well," he said, as I finished my brief narrative, " I have heard about men being fit for Colney Hatch, and you're one!"

"Never mind that," I said, "if Lady Florry gets back her gems."

"And old Brayson is hung for trying to murder you," said Lord Gurtleigh. "But, I say, old fellow, I'm glad I came."

But Brayson was not hung, he only had a taste of penal servitude for the robbery of the jewels and also of some valuable plate, two packages secured in fine wire netting being brought up after proper dredging arrangements had been made.

As for myself, I was none the worse for my submersion, save that my nerves were unsteady for some time, especially when I used to lie and think—

"Suppose that keeper had not seen the light!"

__________________________

Another in the series "Gleams from  a Dark Continent".

6: The Dervish of the Nile Pyramid

Charles J. Mansford.

Strand Magazine, Oct 1895

"IN some respects the sahibs would make worthy followers of Mahomet," said Hassan, our guide, as we sat idly smoking under the awning of our tent one hot day; "for, since the unworthy latchet of their shoes has been the sahibs' servant, he has learnt that they appreciate three things which every good Moslem does— coffee, a pipe, and a story."

"Is there any other quality you would like us to add to the list, Hassan?" Denviers asked the Arab, removing from his mouth the amber-tipped and lengthy Egyptian chibooque which he had been vigorously pulling at; "if there is, you may as well mention it."

"Sahib," Hassan responded, gravely,"there is something better than all these— to be of assistance, when able, to a diligent servant of the Great Prophet!"

"Well," replied Denviers, "you have an ingenious way of asking for whatever favour you require, Hassan, I must admit. However, so long as you do not wish to start off to Arabia the Happy with the pilgrims, you are welcome to carry out any other plan you may have in view."

"The sahibs' slave seeks nothing for himself," Hassan remarked, thoughtfully; "yet, to a true believer, the pilgrimage to Mecca is as a cup of water in the desert to the thirsty. If the Englishmen will listen, what the Arab seeks— it strange dervish whom ye saw of Erment three days ago."

"And a fine specimen of humanity he was, Hassan," Denviers retorted, with a smile. "A cunning glance he gave us indeed from beneath the matted hair which hung down over his naked shoulders. When he clutched at the coins we gave him, I certainly thought he looked much less harmless than the serpent which he was exhibiting, for the latter had a silver ring fastening its mouth to prevent it from biting him, as you said, at all events."

"So Hassan has learnt some news concerning the dervish at last!" I exclaimed to Denviers. "I don't know whether that fanatic claims to be descended from Mahomet or not, but certainly our best plan will be to leave the fellow alone; he deserves no help from us."

"Wisdom lies in the sahib's words," the Arab interposed, as he overheard my remark, "for, concerning the dervish, Hassan heard this morning by chance in one of the bazaars of Erment a strange story, surely. Indeed, because of what has happened, there is one coming to visit the Englishmen who desires their assistance. Badly, indeed, has the dervish wronged a most faithful follower and descendant of the Great Prophet— an Egyptian who has twice performed the holy hajj, or pilgrimage."

"Well, go on, Hassan," Denviers urged, "or probably our visitor will arrive before you are half-way through your yarn." Thus adjured, the Arab stretched himself at our feet and began:—

"Sahibs, of all the dwellers in Erment, Sheik Hammad was long considered the wealthiest and most fortunate. For him caravans travelled far and near, pouring the profits of each expedition into his coffers, until he became so rich that the eyes of envying men were often turned upon him as he walked through the winding ways of Erment, with his daughter Sapphia by his side. For the hand of the latter there were many suitors, but the sheik was unwilling for her to wed, and dismissed those who sought his alliance in this way. As you are aware, sahibs, the pretty women of Egypt may only be seen closely veiled in the streets, while in the harem they are kept to their own apartments. Yet for all that, the beauty of Sapphia became the topic of conversation in the bazaars, by every well-side, and even in the cloisters of the mosques; and, knowing this, Hammad smiled— but kept his daughter from those who longed to loosen the strings of his purse.

"One day, as Sheik Hammad lay upon a divan in his harem thinking of a new caravan which he had raised and recently sent to Tripoli, a eunuch announced the visit of a holy man, or dervish, to his master. As all know, no true Egyptian refuses to give such a man audience, and the dervish was consequently received by the sheik with that respect due to the former's religious calling. Hammad rose and then, prostrating himself, touched with his lips the holy man's feet "

"Was the holy man, as you call him, the same dervish that we saw at Erment?" Denviers interposed; "if so, I am sorry for the sheik's act of humility."

"The sahib shall hear," Hassan responded. "The dervish stretched out his hand, and touching the sheik, bade him rise and listen to the message which he had to deliver. Knowing that the holy man was head of a band of dervishes, as, indeed, the green colour of the scanty garment which he wore plainly indicated, Hammad was silent as his visitor told of the wondrous visions vouchsafed to him at times by the original founder of the sect known as the Rifáee. To give a portion of his wealth for the support of these dervishes Hammad knew he would be asked, and, accordingly, the request was acceded to with little demur. The dervish explained how he had long dwelt within a pyramid, once the tomb of a great man of his order; he also declared that it was part of a command given to him in a vision to seek out Hammad and offer to exchange his position with him for a year. The sheik, however, sahibs, feared he would make but a poor substitute to be placed at the head of so many illustrious dervishes, and humbly declined the great honour proposed to him. At this the dervish was troubled in mind, but on Hammad promising a larger sum than at first to the members of the strange sect, the venerable man departed, saying that he would consult the founder of his order when another vision was granted to him."

Denviers smiled at Hassan as he interposed:—

"I expect, if Hammad had consented to the change of position offered him by the dervish, when he was restored at the end of the year, probably he would have found his coffers emptied altogether. After that, the estimable dervish would have had, no doubt, a vision concerning some other rich man."

"The sahib shall hear what happened next," Hassan added. " Dervishes are above the common cravings for wealth."

"Evidently they are," said Denviers, "if we may judge from the disinterested proceedings of this one. However, go on with your yarn, Hassan."

"Shortly afterwards the dervish paid a second visit to the sheik," the Arab continued, "and stated the result of his vision— which was fully as surprising as the first one that had been granted to him. For a long time he spoke to Hammad concerning the importance and position of chief dervish, while, to all his words, the sheik carefully listened, expecting to be asked to reconsider his former decision. You may easily understand, then, sahibs, the surprise of Hammad when the dervish flung himself at the sheik's feet and exclaimed : —

" 'See! You, who are but a sheik, have it in your power to be raised far above all other Egyptians ! '

" 'Bend not to me,' answered Hammad ; ' for,' as you say, I am only a sheik, while you are the most famous dervish of all the land which the Nile waters.'

"The dervish rose and glanced curiously into Hammad's face: 'Is it wise to refuse power?' he asked, gravely.

" 'Not if one seeks it,' the sheik answered, cautiously.

" 'Listen to what I would say,' the dervish continued: 'wealth and influence can each accomplish much ; he who has both is master of his fate.'

" 'You speak in riddles,' Hammad replied: 'I wait to learn the meaning of your words.'

" 'The meaning is clear enough,' the dervish replied: 'with you is wealth, with me influence. Let us unite our powers.' Still the sheik was puzzled.

" 'How may that be done?' he asked, little imagining what the reply would be.

" 'Easily enough,' returned the dervish: 'your daughter is fair to look upon, give her to me in. marriage.' Hammad stared at the dervish for a minute without replying, then said, with a forced laugh:—

" 'Surely you jest. Holy men such as you never wed; for Sapphia, my daughter, to become your bride would be impossible.'

" 'The Great Prophet wedded more than once,' the dervish retorted: 'am I, his unworthy follower, to imagine that he erred in aught he did?'

" 'I know not,' replied Hammad, who at last began to see that the dervish intended, directly or indirectly, to get some share of the sheik's wealth for himself; 'but of this you may be assured: the great honour of being related to an illustrious dervish such as you are would overwhelm me. I cannot allow you to extend your friendship for me to such a pass.'

" 'You refuse the alliance?' the dervish asked.

" 'That is what my words are meant to convey,' replied the sheik, with a decided but deferential air. His visitor moved to where a small brazier stood in one part of the room, and before the sheik could prevent him he thrust something upon the live charcoal.

" 'See!' cried the dervish; 'you have sealed your own fate! Seed of coriander, frankincense, and shreds of a written charm give forth the smoke and fragrance which steal upon your senses. Send out caravans, and plan to send out others; give your daughter to a rich man as you think to do; but, by the charms which are mine, I say all that you venture upon shall fail. Your wealth shall be lost and poverty shall come upon you, sickness shall seize upon the fair Sapphia and you, her sire; men shall accuse you of possessing the evil eye, and women shall hide their children's faces lest you look upon them to their hurt! A foolish and a mad choice have you made, but now by it you must abide; for not even dust brought from the tomb of the Great Prophet will be able to cast from you the spell which the charm upon the glowing embers casts upon you ! In the byways and bazaars of Erment, day by day, I will gather the people together and declare by the serpent, symbol of the Nile, the wrong you have done me; and what is your reward to be, you, who have brought the head of the dervishes face to face with dishonour ? '

"Hammad, sahibs," the Arab went on, as we listened to the account of the dervish's idle threats, "knew only too well that misfortune would come upon him from that hour. He stretched out his hands imploringly to the holy man and besought him to remove the spell— but the dervish was inexorable. He turned and left the apartment, his face flushed with anger and disappointment, while Hammad tried to repeat the first chapter of the Koran, which, every true believer knows, has much power to protect the one who recites it. His senses suddenly were overcome by the power of the dervish's imprecation—"

"Or by the fumes from whatever the estimable dervish flung upon the charcoal?" Denviers interrupted, as he smiled incredulously.

"As I said, sahibs," Hassan went on; "Hammad's senses were affected by the imprecation, and, with a cry to Allah and Mahomet for help, he fell down in a swoon upon the richly-carpeted floor of the apartment. Hearing the voice of their master, two eunuchs ran in to his assistance. They raised him, and succeeded in restoring the sheik to consciousness, but from that hour his health began to fail him. A week later Hammad received word that every camel belonging to the expedition he had sent to Tripoli had died on the way; his slaves had deserted him, fearing to return, since, in the midst of their misfortune, down upon them swooped a band of Bedouins, who carried off all the merchandise with which the camels had been loaded. Day after day the sheik had to listen to similar accounts of his losses, while the dervish explained to those who gathered about him in the bazaars how Hammad's own evil eye had brought upon himself these misfortunes.

"At last the sheik determined to make a pilgrimage to Mecca, accompanied by his daughter, for he feared that if he delayed much longer, death itself would come upon him. With a part of his diminished wealth that remained, Hammad purchased a camel, and placing his daughter Sapphia upon it, the sheik set out with the pilgrims bound for the birthplace of the Great Prophet. Leading the camel and supporting himself with a long spear, which Hammad knew would probably be wanted in their defence from the bands of marauding Bedouins, the sheik made the whole of the journey to Suez on foot. From Erment, where stands the famous temple built at the command of the lovely Cleopatra, they passed by Thebes with its wondrous ruins, where the eyes of Sapphia glanced in awe at the two giant statues, whose stern, mysterious faces the morning sun gilded, outlining their twin shadows, dark and grotesque, upon the scorching sand. At Dendarah, too, they lingered, and amid its fallen columns Hammad spoke to his daughter of the wonders of the processions of the priests of the goddess Athor when they would sacrifice to her because of the year's return. Then to Asyut they pressed on, through its emerald green pastures, its flowers, and the flocks that fed there, on through the valley of the Nile till Cairo was reached, the fairest city of all. At Suez, when there the pilgrims arrived, Hammad found to his dismay that the dervish was one of the great throng bound for the Holy City, for, as he passed one of its mosques, the holy man emerged from a porch and held up a warning hand to the sheik.

" 'Your pilgrimage is in vain!' the dervish cried. 'Whether you would go by land or sea, your eyes will never behold the City of Mahomet!'

"Before Hammad could reply, the dervish disappeared in the surging crowd, and the sheik was filled with the belief that his death was at hand. Sapphia urged upon her sire to take ship to Yambo, the City of the Sea, and thence to journey to Mecca. Hammad, however, found that the pilgrim ship was already overcrowded with passengers; and at last, in his anxiety to reach the Holy City, he proceeded by a clumsy craft, the owner of which willingly offered to convey the two pilgrims to Yambo. Among those who had set out from Erment was a young Egyptian of good birth, and he had often conversed with Hammad on the long march, so that when they reached Suez he still wished to accompany the sheik even to Mecca, and by persuasion prevailed upon the owner of the vessel to accept him as a passenger.

Well, indeed, was it for Sapphia that the young Egyptian did so.

"Leaning over the vessel's side that night, watching the play of the waters of the gulf, as the waves leapt about the stem of the vessel that cleaved its way onward, Hammad suddenly heard a cry that came, he knew, from Sapphia's lips. Drawing his sword he ran in the direction whence the sound came. There he saw his daughter struggling to free herself from several Arabs, who were trying to force her over the side of the vessel opposite to where the sheik had been idly resting. With a cry to Allah for succour, Hammad rushed upon the Arabs, only to find himself instantly surrounded by them. To his assistance, however, Khedi, the young Egyptian, came; the owner of the craft and his crew keeping discreetly out of the way, or probably being in collusion with the Arabs, who were doubtless instigated by the dervish to carry Sapphia off. Hand to hand they contended, Hammad and his companion, the Egyptian, fighting with a desperate courage that awed their assailants. The deck grew slippery with the blood of the evil men, and at last, in sheer despair, the remainder of those who were uninjured flung themselves over the vessel's side into the waves, but whether they afterwards succeeded in entering their boat, sahibs, no one knows, for when the owner of the vessel at last approached, he found Khedi, the Egyptian, and Sapphia, with her veil rent, both supporting Hammad, who lay upon the deck. The latter feebly drew his daughter's head down, and whispered something into her ear, and even as she assented to the sheik's request, his face grew rigid and they saw that the dervish's threats were not idle— Hammad was dead ! Landing at Yambo, Sapphia made no attempt to continue the pilgrimage, and Khedi, the Egyptian, purchasing for her a camel, as well as one for himself, by land they returned without further mishap until even Erment was reached from which they had set out. There Sapphia remained to mourn the death of Hammad, while Khedi the Egyptian, who as a boy had once performed the pilgrimage, went a second time when the next year came round to thank Allah and Mahomet for his preservation, as well as for saving Sapphia from the dervish's plot. Now, sahibs, comes the strangest part of the story, for he who is coming to seek your aid is none other than Khedi, the young Egyptian, and ye shall hear why he does so.

"The only surviving kinsman of Sapphia was so much influenced by the account of Khedi's bravery, that when the young Egyptian went to him and sought her hand he consented, especially as he had heard a rumour that the dervish was still determined to wed Hammad's daughter. Accordingly, on the afternoon of the second day before Khedi was to receive his bride, the procession which then takes place set out through the streets of Erment. Musicians went before; next, attired in garments of white, a number of the fairest daughters of Egypt followed. Beneath a canopy of rose-coloured silk, which four men supported, Sapphia walked closely veiled, her lustrous black eyes alone visible as she glanced at the gay throng there to do her honour. Suddenly, in the midst of those gathered there, a horseman urged a richly caparisoned steed and, as the crowd reluctantly gave way to avoid the horse's hoofs, each man muttered in his neighbour's ear the name of the dervish whom all knew so well. From the crooked by-ways of the city, from beneath the porches of the adjacent mosque, from every quarter there came forth the dervishes, of whom he who was mounted upon the horse was the leader. Round him they gathered, dressed as they were in scanty, sordid garments, and then broke right through the musicians and maidens behind them.

" 'In the name of Allah, I claim my bride!' the dervish cried ; and before the astonished throng could intercept him, he snatched up Sapphia and flung her before him, then urged his steed quickly forward, while his followers ran by his side, thrusting back those who sought to break through the cordon. So well had the dervish laid his plans, sahibs, that Khedi, the young Egyptian, to whom the story was quickly told, found himself too late to interfere, for Sapphia was far beyond his reach, and his enemy had worsted him! From what he heard, the dervish carried Sapphia off to a certain ruined pyramid, which he and his followers are said to tenant ; but none of his own race will assist the Egyptian to recover his stolen bride. In the streets of Erment I met him this morning, and learning that this strange affair took place but yesterday, while the sahibs were with their slave away visiting some ruins, I promised to endeavour to get from you the aid he needs."

"Well, Hassan," said Denviers, thoughtfully, as the Arab concluded his strange story, "if Khedi, as you say this Egyptian is named, asks us to help him we will agree ; but it is evident that we shall run into considerable danger in doing so."

"Allah bless the sahibs," Hassan fervently returned. "When the Egyptian comes—"

"If I am not mistaken, he is already approaching our tent," I interrupted, as I saw someone crossing the sandy plain which stretched before us.

"The sahib is right," Hassan answered, as he rose and prepared to welcome the stranger; "for he who is making for the tent is none other than Khedi, the Egyptian!"

ii

FOLLOWING our guide, we advanced to meet the one who sought our aid. From the richness of the robes which he wore, Khedi was evidently a man of high position. As he bent deferentially before us I noticed that his limbs, although slight, were well-knit, while the deep bronze of his oval face, his broad forehead, and the grave glance which he turned upon us as we neared him, plainly enough betokened that he belonged to the race dwelling beside the Nile. Denviers listened in silence to Khedi's remarks ; then, while the Egyptian conversed with Hassan, my companion and I drew apart and discussed the man's proposals.

"One thing is certain," said Denviers, at last. "Khedi's plan is useless, for if we went with him to the ruined pyramid, of which he speaks, and then openly demanded the stolen bride from the dervish, we should gain little or nothing by it. Besides, I don't like the way in which he plays with the handle of the sword he carries ; he speaks gravely enough at present, but once he gets into the dervish's presence his self-control may vanish, and probably our liberty with it."

"After all, it is only by hearsay that we understand Sapphia to be the dervish's prisoner," I responded. " If we went together, we could invent some excuse by which to get into that estimable fellow's presence, and afterwards we would probably be able to hit upon some reasonable plan for the woman's rescue."

"Just so, Harold," Denviers answered; "we must have some clear idea of the way to the ruined pyramid. We will get that from Khedi, and then leave him and Hassan here. As we hourly expect Kass to arrive with our Wadigo followers, ahead of whom we have pushed on, so as to explore some of these ruins as we arranged, it is absolutely necessary for one of the three of us to await those on the march. Hassan would be very useful to us, but as it is we must leave him here."

Without further discussion we joined our guide and Khedi. From the latter we obtained a clear description of the route to the pyramid, and having persuaded him to agree to our going without him, we started, leaving our rifles in Hassan's charge, so that if we entered the dervish's presence he would understand our visit as being of a friendly nature.

For a considerable time we pushed on steadily, noting carefully as we went the various landmarks which Khedi had mentioned. Sometimes these were a few overthrown pillars, or an obelisk still standing upright, its weather-worn hieroglyphics beyond our power to decipher. Once we rested on the huge, broken-off paw of some creature hewn in stone, the rest of which, for aught we knew, was buried far down in the shifting, burning sands at our feet. Towards sunset, however, we found ourselves entering a great cleft in the rocky range barring our way, and glancing up at either side as on we went, we saw that in many places the stone had been hewn into uncouth shapes, among which could be observed vast temples in various stages of decay, and such as we had not previously seen during our travels in Egypt. Soft and subdued fell the light from the entry and from above the vast fissure upon the strange handiwork of man that confronted us at every turn of the rocky way. For several minutes we passed on in silence between a double row of sphinxes, until before us rose a wall of granite, which seemed to cut off further progress.

Just as we were discussing the reason why the Egyptian had not spoken of the intervening rock, Denviers caught my arm and pointed upward. Glancing there I saw what appeared to be a low archway, and, rapidly following my companion as he made his way up the narrow way which we discerned leading to it, we were soon confronted by two half-naked dervishes wearing as their sole garment a strip of green cloth wound about their loins. We recognised immediately their similarity to the one we had seen in the streets of Erment, and, accosting the foremost of them, Denviers asked, as best he could, for an audience with their head or chief. The man and his fellow-watcher first profoundly bowed, then greeted us with a derisive laugh, which caused us for the moment to repent that our weapons of defence had been left behind. One of the dervishes then hastily disappeared into the narrow passage, returning quickly with several others, who hustled rather than led us down the slanting way. At intervals the passage was broken by corridors running across it, but our guides, or captors as the dervishes seemed to consider themselves, hurried us directly on until we had advanced considerably more than a hundred paces. There, in response to their cries, a huge portcullis of stone which ran easily in its grooves was raised. No sooner had we passed within the grotesquely-carved vestibule than this portcullis dropped quickly behind us as we went on our way, the shaft continuing for some distance and being frequently intersected.

"We are prisoners, safe enough, Harold," muttered Denviers in my ear. "I don't think these unwashed dervishes part with their guests in a hurry."

"It looks to me remarkably like—" I began, then ceased speaking as I glanced in surprise at the scene which faced us. We had entered what at one time had been the interment chamber of the one in honour of whom the pyramid had been raised, but which, at this time, served for a very different purpose. Some of the stone blocks had been removed from above for the admission of light, for through countless minute pieces of glass set in a gracefully carved framework the rays of the setting sun entered the chief dervish's dwelling.

Distant as was the century in which the pyramid had been constructed, the slabs of polished red gr an ite, forming the inner sides and roof of the apartment, seemed as perfect as though recently placed there. Set in niches that rose from the floor to high above our heads were placed at intervals great images of sacred bulls carved in stone, while pillars as white in hue rose upward and branched out fan-shaped till they were pressed against the partly-gilded roof they supported, their outlines marked there with great streaks of colour, ochrous and blue.

Passing on, with curious glances at all we saw, we were brought suddenly before the one to see whom again we had undertaken the adventure. Resting on a raised block of stone, approached by three steps, we saw the dervish who, in the streets of Erment, had clutched our gifts as though in need of them. The light from the window high above fell upon him as he sat there, his sordid attire and neglected hair being strangely out of keeping with the splendour of the apartment, and still more so with the effeminate adornments which he wore. About his stained turban was wreathed a curious ornament much like the koor which Egyptian women of rank wear ; of gold it was, thickly inset with gems, the centre one being a splendid emerald. About the neck and wrists of the dervish were strung heavy beads of gold; among them glittered several brilliants.

While we stood uncovered before the chief dervish, one of his followers sharply questioned us as to the reason for our visit, holding upright a green banner, which, from Hassan, we afterwards learnt was the distinctive emblem of the great Rifáee sect. To a string of inquiries put to us, Denviers gave replies which apparently satisfied the chief dervish, and we were even hoping to obtain the information we sought as to Sapphia's whereabouts, when a cry rang through the apartment. We turned and glanced with ill-concealed vexation at the cause of it. Pushing his way hurriedly into the chief's presence, down flat on his face a dervish flung himself, then rising quickly he delivered a message to him. Instantly the chief dervish rose and, catching the man by the throat, cried:—

"It is impossible; say that it is false!"

The subject dervish held up his hands imploringly, then, finding himself released, he gasped out:—

"By Allah and Mahomet, what I have said, is said! False words for the wrongdoers are— but thy slave speaks the truth alone!"

The chief dervish glanced threateningly at us.

"Speak!" he exclaimed. "You declare you come here in peace. Why, then, have you plotted against me?"

We stared at him blankly, not understanding in the slightest degree the cause of his anger.

"We have wronged you in no way," Denviers answered, quietly. "If you have any charge to make against us, let it be said; otherwise we cannot refute it."

"Tell me," the chief dervish asked, "have you heard aught in the bazaars of Erment concerning Sapphia, the daughter of one Hammad?"

Denviers gave a cautious reply, which, however, failed to accomplish what he purposed.

"You acknowledge that you have!" the chief dervish broke in. "Answer, then, where is she? "

"It is rumoured in Erment that she is an inmate of this strange pyramid, or harem as it seems to have become," my companion answered, with a calmness which he was far from feeling, for our position had most unexpectedly become serious.

"Hear me!" his questioner cried. "Yesterday, by the right which I claim as head of this most illustrious sect, I claimed for my bride one who had been unjustly bestowed upon another. She was placed under the charge of the women of my anderoon, for which purpose one of the divisions of the pyramid serves. To me, as the greatest Rifáee, visions are granted; in obedience to one of them, Sapphia was carried off. Still seeking guidance, I have passed the intervening time within the place containing the sarcophagus of the founder of our order. No word has reached me from the women of the anderoon as is customary for them to send. Growing uneasy, I sent to ask why. The women are all bewailing what has happened, and— well, ye both know how it came about."

"I have said we know little about what you so obscurely hint at. Certainly, as we have not even seen your bride, we are at a loss to understand what has occurred."

"Ye speak falsely, by Allah!" the dervish interrupted. "For since ye entered this pyramid an hour ago, Sapphia, my bride, has been snatched from me ! "

"We are astonished ! " cried Denviers, in a conciliatory tone. "We saw you once in Erment; afterwards we heard of your great fame, and determined to visit you— that is all the explanation we can possibly offer you for our presence here."

"A flattering and a false answer," the dervish responded, clenching his fingers with wrath; "but to your words my ears are closed even as are the camel's nostrils to the sand-storm. If by to-morrow's dawn those whom I hear have gone at once in pursuit of Sapphia do not overtake her, ye shall both die for your share in the deeply-laid scheme by which I have been despoiled. Pray Allah my bride be brought back, or—" the dervish pointed to the string of a bow which one of his subjects held, a gesture as significant as it was unpleasant.

At a sign from their chief, the fanatical dervishes flung themselves upon us. We fought with our hands for freedom, but were soon overpowered and forced up the slanting passage through which we had come. At the intersection of one of its corridors we were turned aside until a low stone door was reached, which turned with ease as we were thrust within a granite-flagged recess, lit only by a flickering lamp suspended by a long chain from the roof, and there we were left.

"I fancy our adventures are over at last, Frank," I said, gloomily; "my opinion is that Sapphia's escape has been made an excuse for seizing us. How are we to know but what she is still in some part of the pyramid? This treacherous dervish has evidently determined to put an end to our existence."

"It certainly looks like it," he replied. "I thought he was too friendly from the first, but still his words had a genuine ring about them, which completely threw me off my guard. I thought that his cunning expression was due to the race he belongs to. If Sapphia has really managed to escape, no doubt there are some of the dervishes implicated in it who will naturally stir up the wrath of their chief against us, so as to shift the blame from their own shoulders on to ours."

"There is no way of getting out of this place except by the door," I commented, after a careful survey; "and that method of egress is past our power to use."

"The worst of the affair is that the woman did not need our help, if what the dervish declares is true, and, if it is false, then we shall be put to death without doing anything whatever to save her."

"In my opinion, this is the worst scrape we have ever been in," I added; "for even if we got out of here, which is most unlikely to happen, there is that stone portcullis cutting off further retreat— to say nothing of the dervish's followers who handled us so roughly as soon as they got his permission."

We sank down on the stone floor, but were too much disturbed to sleep, although for several hours nothing occurred to us. We were both convinced of the dervish's desire to destroy us, and had given up all hope of escape when, glancing at the stone door by chance, I saw it slowly revolve.

"Look!" I whispered into Denviers's ear, and a moment afterwards we started together to our feet, as someone entered and quickly thrust-to the door.

iii

WE GLANCED in strange surprise at the intruder, who was an Egyptian woman, and closely veiled. Was Sapphia before us? we both wondered, as our unexpected visitor advanced and stood before us. Her first words, however, dispelled the supposition.

"Sapphia has escaped from the pyramid," she said. "You are accused of helping her; but the women of the dervish's harem know that is false. Listen!" she continued— for Denviers had attempted to ask a question— "there is no time to be lost if you value your lives. Hear me, then: Sapphia's sire once did a service for mine, since both dwelt in Erment. To be the dervish's bride I thought an honour ; she considered it otherwise, and besought us to help her to escape. Last night, when none save the guards of the pyramid's entrance were alert, some of the women of the harem rose, and helped to free Sapphia. We let her down from a window of the strange anderoon—"

"We heard that she escaped soon after our arrival to-day," Denviers interposed, quietly.

"So the chief dervish was informed," the Egyptian woman answered; "for at that hour her absence from the harem first became known. To have told our beloved Abbah that he had been despoiled of his new-found bride, hours before he knew it, would have brought the messenger of the news one reward— a sack and the Nile. Every woman of this land loves intrigue; in the escape of Sapphia, Abbah will understand the lesson he has sometimes forgotten— great treasures need great safeguards. To what fate are you consigned?"

"The bowstring," replied my companion, at whose answer I felt a cold shudder run through me: "unless you can help us to escape."

"I?" the Egyptian woman asked. "Would that I could free you; as it is, I can only give you a little help— the rest will depend upon yourselves. Although you speak my language well, I see that you belong not to this land. Had you done so I might have influenced the three night-guards to have set you free— but you are Franks, if I judge rightly. No dervish will help you and, moreover, you are unarmed. What I can do I will; if it fail, you can but die, even as you are already condemned to do."

"We will accept the slightest chance of escape that offers," I returned, promptly. The woman was silent for a few minutes, then suddenly moved to the door. She held up a warning hand to us, as we began to follow her, then disappeared before we could clasp the stone edge of the revolving door to prevent it from shutting.

"I thought this Egyptian woman meant to help us, Frank," I said to Denviers, as we stood by the door, which had securely closed upon us. "It looks to me as if the dervish has sent her to raise false hopes within us."

"Perhaps her courage suddenly failed," he responded; "the Nile is inconveniently near for any one of the dervish's household who plots against him."

He had hardly finished his remark when the door opened again and, drawing them from under her hanging veil, the woman, who had returned, pressed in our hands two jewelled daggers.

"They are mine," she whispered. "If you are taken with them upon you, my life, no less than your own, will be forfeited. Remember this and be resolute. If ever you escape, seek out Sapphia and say that I helped you, lest the knowledge of your deaths might cloud the day when she weds Khedi, her lover, of whom you know nothing."

We did not contradict the woman's last remark, but waited impatiently for her to unfold whatever plan she had for our escape.

"From the high window of the women's anderoon you might escape, but thither I dare not lead you. No; your way lies beyond the guarded portcullis and the three dervishes who keep watch there. Hear, then, how the heavy stone framework is moved."

Denviers shrugged his shoulders. "It seems to me that such information is useless," he remarked. "How are we to get near enough to it without being discovered?"

"Have patience and you shall hear. Heavy as is the portcullis, it moves easily enough by a touch of the projection, which you will see in the second stone block on the right— counting from the base. You have seen the many corridors which intersect the main slanting shaft— one of them opens within fifteen feet of where the watching dervishes are. Without difficulty you can reach the corridor; once there, lurk in the shadow of its entry and wait for what follows. If an opportunity occur, dash out and make good your escape by raising the portcullis; if not, you can but return here and await the fate which presses close upon you both, for it wants scarcely an hour to dawn, and then you die. No more will I tell you— speak! are you ready to attempt what may bring you safety or, at the worst, death a little sooner than Abbah has decreed?"

"Will your own life be imperilled if we escape?" Denviers asked.

"Not so, for at times I traverse the corridors at night when the chief dervish is within the apartment where you saw him. Besides, my words to the guards will be spoken warningly; neither they nor the chief dervish will suspect me, for none know of the service rendered to mine, and which to Sapphia I would repay." Then lowering her voice, the woman told us where the escaped one had been urged to conceal herself from those who might pursue her.

"We will make the attempt, then," Denviers answered, and a minute after we were beyond the stone door. Following the Egyptian woman, who acted as our guide, we passed further down the corridor than was the place of our confinement, until we reached another way intersecting at right angles. Up the latter we cautiously advanced, then again we turned.

"This last is the corridor of which I spoke," our guide whispered: "for your lives, make not the slightest sound as you proceed; watch carefully at the end until again I appear." Without further delay she left us, passing back by the way we came.

"I wonder how the dervishes are armed?" Denviers muttered to me. "These weapons of ours will be poor things with which to ward off a sword-stroke."

"We must take our chance," I whispered in reply, feeling convinced that his words were only too true. Slowly and carefully we passed down the corridor, moving close to the stone wall in the shadow which fell upon one side of the passage. Nearer and nearer we got to the entrance, until at last we crouched together where we could see the three dervishes of whom the Egyptian woman had spoken. We noticed that they were close to the portcullis; one of them, indeed, was idly leaning his back against it, standing in such a position that he could see clearly anything that appeared in the part of the shaft he faced.

Three fierce-looking fellows the dervishes were, each armed with a heavy-handled dagger, the blade of which was very wide near the haft, but narrowed to a long, keen end, the weapons being considerably larger than those the woman had given us. It was evident that we could only act on the defensive, for, as the dervishes stood there, we knew it would be quite useless to make an attempt to escape. As we watched them and caught part of their conversation, which was carried on in Arabic, the one who leant against the portcullis suddenly stood upright and pointed down the passage. Instantly the others turned about, and one of them exclaimed:—

"See! The queen of Abbah's harem approaches!"

"A strange hour for her to wander here," replied the one who stood to his right.

"She has too much freedom," retorted he who had first seen her, as we heard footsteps slowly drawing near; "she was Abbah's first bride, or—" The rest of the remark did not reach us, for when the woman approached the three dervishes promptly salaamed. From the slit in her veil the Egyptian glanced at them in apparent anger.

"Fools!" she cried; "to think that Abbah, my lord and yours, should trust aught to your keeping!" The dervishes were considerably astonished, wondering what was laid to their charge. "But a few hours ago Abbah's latest bride escaped, and none of you know how that came about; now, alas! worse has happened—"

"Worse?" interrogated one of the dervishes. "What can be even as unfortunate?"

"Aye, worse," the Egyptian woman went on. "Disturbed by the events of the day, I could not rest, and so entered the chief apartment where Abbah keeps vigil. He lay still upon the marble at the base of one of the great images. Thinking that he slept, I passed away. A strange fancy came upon me to visit the place into which the prisoners had been thrust, they whom ye say planned and carried out Sapphia's escape. The door stood open— the prisoners were gone!"

"Escaped?" the dervishes cried together, as they snatched their weapons from their sides.

"Escaped even while you three have pretended to keep watch. Does Abbah sleep, think you, or have the Franks slain him, and are they still hiding there after what they have done ? Go, find and slay them!"

"They cannot have left the pyramid, for the portcullis has never been raised since they entered here," replied the dervish who leant against it. "If Abbah live, as I pray Allah and the Prophet he may, he shall find one who has kept his post."

"The great dervish, Abbah, our lord, is at the mercy of these false Franks!" cried one of the others; "while you keep guard we will follow the queen of the harem and search for them."

"I dare not witness the slaying of men," the woman answered. "Go, seek them out, and give no alarm until you have them in your power; I will await here your return."

Down the gloomy passage the two dervishes disappeared. When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Denviers caught my arm and whispered:—

"Come on, I will keep the dervish at bay while you find the spring of the portcullis."

We ran out from our place of concealment upon the dervish, who was conversing with the Egyptian woman, whose scheme we then easily understood. In a moment the man thrust her aside and confronted us boldly, while the woman covered her eyes with the end of her veil as if in great terror at our unexpected appearance.

Denviers aimed a blow at the dervish with his dagger, but catching it on his own weapon the man made a return lunge, which my companion warded off with considerable difficulty. Quickly I caught sight of the projection, and, pressing upon it, caused the heavy portcullis to be slowly raised. Just as I did so, a cry from Denviers's lips struck upon my ears, but before I could take warning from it, I was seized from behind and flung upon the paved floor. Looking up, I saw who my assailant was— the chief dervish himself! For a minute I was completely startled, then seizing the weapon in my belt I snatched it out and aimed an upward blow at my unexpected assailant. He caught my wrist and endeavoured to wrench away the weapon, raising loud cries for assistance. Close over me he bent ; I flung my disengaged arm about him and tried to drag him down, convinced that a few seconds would decide my fate— for I heard the dervishes returning at their chief's cry for succour. I got him beneath me, when suddenly I was pulled away. Denviers having separated us; for his own enemy lay prone almost at my feet.

"Look ! Run ! Run for your life!" he cried, as the dervishes were closing upon us, and one of them pressed the projection of the portcullis. We shook ourselves free from them, and with a dash got beyond the descending heavy bars of stone, which even grazed Denyiers's head as both passed safely beneath it.

Down fell the portcullis as we ran headlong, making for the entry, urged on by the fanatical cries of the dervishes, who quickly raised the obstruction and pursued us. We passed down the narrow path and ran on in the gloom until we reached the avenue of sphinxes. In the hollow formed by two huge extended paws we crouched, while our pursuers still ran on— to fail in their search and to return disappointed. As soon as we dared, we set out to where our tent was pitched, and arrived there, contrary to our expectation, without being pursued again, and having with us Sapphia, whom we accidentally discovered in a retreat in which the queen of the harem had advised her to hide.

Hassan and Khedi came across the sandy waste to meet us. We explained what had happened, whereupon the Egyptian, with many protestations of gratitude, bore off his bride to Erment.

"Well, Hassan," said Denviers to our Arab guide, as we threw ourselves down to rest in the tent, "you do not seem much disturbed at the fact that you had no part in our adventure, although usually you express great disappointment."

"The sahib's slave has no cause for regret," Hassan answered. "The Englishmen have escaped with their lives, while the Great Prophet has chosen to reward also the dust of their august feet, so that all is well." As he spoke the Arab drew from his sash a curiously-worked Egyptian purse apparently well filled. Our grave guide had used the opportunity of our absence to extract for his own personal benefit a liberal backsheesh from the Egyptian. "Khedi deserved to have his bride restored, sahibs," he added, "and their slave has enough gold to buy himself a camel with!"

Without waiting for our views on the subject, Hassan found it convenient to have some business with Kass, our chief Wadigo follower, who had then arrived, and hurried away accordingly.

_____________________

7: Murder Needs No Motive

Robert L. Ahern

1922-1948

Thrilling Mystery, May 1942

MANNY FORD knew he was going to kill Big Bill Stendler some day. He knew how he was going to do it, too. He was going to face Stendler with a big gun in his hand and empty the big gun in Stendler's pudgy face. Manny had sworn to do exactly that, in front of fifty people at Stendler's Calypso Club. Stendler had beaten Manny senseless afterwards and thrown him out of the club with a laugh. But Manny was going to do it.

He hated Stendler with a hate that lived and grew within him like a tumor. Manny was broke and shabby and half-hungry now— and he owed all that to Stendler. Manny hadn't always been broke. He'd had a big black car and someone else to drive it and money to burn. He'd had fingers in all the big pies and control of many of them— numbers, book-making, protection. Then Big Bill Stendler had moved in.

He'd forced his way into Manny's penthouse with two or three of his hoods, given Manny a beating and a ticket to Chicago and booted him out. Manny's own boys had simply folded up and quit, and Manny learned later that it was a put-up job. They'd been fixed— some of them were still working for Stendler.

But what hurt Manny most was his pride. Stendler hadn't even bothered to kill him. Just a beating and a ticket to Chicago, and Stendler had taken over.

Of course, Stendler had lost out, too, when Dewey took over— though he still had a few clubs around town —but Manny hated him none the less. And Manny was going to kill him.

But Manny was broke now, and he was just a little guy. He knew from his own experience that little guys didn't get away with murder. It took money to kill— and Manny hadn't even money enough to buy a gun, let alone hire somebody for the job. Anyhow, Manny wouldn't have done it that way. He hated Stendler too much, not to have the pleasure himself.

Manny was also a little afraid. He was afraid of the grilling in the back room of some suburban police station, which would be inevitable. Too many people were aware of his hatred of Stendler, and the way he had sworn to do it would point inexorably toward his guilt. He was afraid, too, of Ben Moody, the plodding cold-blooded Homicide lieutenant, who had been present when Manny made his threat.

But Manny was going to do it— just the way he had sworn to do it. It was as sure as death and taxes and Allied Victory.

Manny would drop into the Calypso Club occasionally to hate Stendler silently. Stendler tolerated him now, would buy him a drink and ask him, jeeringly, how the killing was coming. And Manny would drink the drink and hate Stendler silently.

THUS, when Big Bill Stendler got what was probably coming to him in his private office at the Calypso Club very early one Wednesday morning, Ben Moody knew well where the long arm should reach. It was pointed straight at Manny Ford.

It was almost too obvious. Bill Stendler's face was hardly recognizable, filled full of slugs from what Ballistics declared was a .45-caliber automatic. Five slugs had been placed, oddly enough, in the pattern of a crude M—one in each eye, one through the nose and one through each corner of Stendler's warped mouth—M, as in Manny.

Ben Moody went looking for Manny. He didn't find him at home nor in any of his regular haunts. So Moody put out a general pick-up order.

It took less than half an hour to find him, and Manny, it seemed, had quite an alibi. In fact, he'd spent the last two nights in jail, arrested the day previous for panhandling on the City Hall steps.

Ben Moody swore and chewed several cigars to ribbons. He didn't like it a bit. Manny Ford was broke, all right, but not to the point of panhandling.

Moody even went so far as to interrogate the personnel of the Precinct where Manny was being held. He was informed with no small amusement that unless Manny had squeezed between the bullpen bars, made himself invisible before the two jailers, somehow wormed his way through a two-inch-thick steel door and slipped past the Desk-Sergeant, Manny had certainly spent Monday and Tuesday nights in Cell 7, Block A.

Baffled and angered, Ben Moody went back to his desk to chew up some more cigars and wait for something to break.

JOHN HARGRAVE planned carefully. He had to kill Hank Miller, and he had to kill him perfectly. John Hargrave was only forty-five, and he had no intention of spending the rest of his life in prison, or terminating it more abruptly in an electric chair.

It wasn't that Hargrave particularly hated Miller. But Hargrave was a business man, and Miller was not. They were partners in a successful brokerage house. Hargrave was the senior and probably the wealthier. And they had been stealing from each other for years. Hargrave had been stealing Miller's money, and Miller had been stealing Hargrave's wife.

The only thing that worried Hargrave, however, was the fact that Miller might wake up one day and realize just why he, Hargrave, was the more wealthy. The ensuing investigation might prove extremely embarrassing. This embarrassment might last five or ten years— and Hargrave was not a courageous thief. So he had to kill Miller.

What went on between his wife and Miller meant nothing to Hargrave. He had long ago lost interest in her, and if she chose to cavort with another man, it was no trouble to him. He would be glad to be rid of her. He had mentioned divorce once, but she had refused. Apparently, she wanted both Hargrave's money and Miller's affections. He would be glad to be rid of her.

It was a thought! If he could catch them together when he killed Miller— It was a good thought! She would never believe her husband hadn't killed Miller, no matter how well he covered his tracks. So he decided definitely that they both should go.

WHEN Hank Miller and Hargrave's wife were found shot to death together in an uptown hotel suite, suspicion pointed to John Hargrave, the husband in the case, the dead man's partner. It looked like a crime of passion.

But Hargrave could not be located, and Ben Moody hesitated at putting out a pickup order. Hargrave was a man of some influence. The clerks and bell boys were quizzed, of course, but it was a big hotel, and many people passed in and out. So Ben Moody had to prowl and prod for a few days before he really had something to work with.

It turned up in the form of the Hargrave & Miller Co. books. Moody went over them with a Certified Public Accountant, and they were both astounded at the liquidations that had taken place. While nothing criminal could be proved, since Miller was dead, the books clearly had been doctored. Also, it seemed, everything was quite in order for Hargrave to take over complete control of the business— papers drawn up, contracts altered, etc. Just as though Hank Miller had been about to retire— or die.

But Ben Moody didn't have to put out the pickup order. John Hargrave calmly turned up at his Long Island home that very night. He explained that he'd just returned from a week of skiing in the Laurentian Mountains —250 miles north of Montreal, about 600 from New York.

John Hargrave went quietly to jail for twenty-four hours, charged with spitting on the sidewalk, while Moody checked with the Canadian Customs officials and the costly ski lodge where Hargrave claimed he'd stayed. Where he had stayed. There wasn't a possibility that Hargrave could have slipped back to New York, killed Miller and his wife and returned without being missed. Also, there was a buxom blonde in the offing who indignantly backed Hargrave's story completely.

Once more, Ben Moody was baffled, and the newspapers began to ride him a little. Two unsolved murders in two weeks spelled shake-up. Moody had to release Hargrave.

But before he did he made it a point to give Hargrave's house a thorough going-over. He was much disappointed, turning up nothing pertaining to the murders but a couple of black-and-green paper match books with the emblem of the now defunct Calypsb Club on the cover.

MOODY didn't read any significance in this, however, until Ballistics phoned him the next day.

"Here's a funny thing, Ben," said the Ballistics Lieutenant. "We were just getting in some skull practice, checking the empty shells belonging to the Stendler kill, with those that knocked off Miller and Hargrave's wife. They check! That's right. The same gun fired both. So maybe you just have to look for one killer, Ben. No, there's no mistake."

An amazing idea occurred to Ben Moody. Running it around in his head, he didn't see how he could be wrong— but, proof! In a very short while, the efficient machinery of the Homicide Squad was doing double duty. Moody dispatched squad cars to several points in the city, loaded with expert technical brains, and sat back, chewing a cigar, to wait their return.

When they did, Moody was satisfied. The idea had borne fruit, and Moody was no longer baffled. He sent the cars back to pick up Manny Ford and John Hargrave, hold them in separate rooms.

Hargrave came in first, escorted by a plainclothes detective. He was a tall calculating man, with slightly graying hair and cold gray eyes. He faced Moody without expression.

"Manny Ford just talked," Moody said suddenly.

Hargrave's eyebrows went up.

"Indeed?"

"Yeah! We got him down in the back room and beat it out of him. So you might as well come clean, too."

"Indeed?" Hargrave said again, his expression unchanging. "I understood that the police resorted to such tactics, but never quite believed it. And I'm afraid I don't understand you. Who, for instance, is Manny Ford?"

Moody shrugged. He hadn't really expected anything, but it was worth a try. He had Hargrave taken out as Manny Ford was brought in.

"Did you see that guy just going out of here, Manny?" he asked. "Well, his name is Hargrave, and he just told us a rather interesting story. He's quite a talker, this Hargrave."

"Yeah?" Manny Ford's rabbity features were as frozen as Hargrave's.

"Yeah, Manny! It was a long story, too—about a couple of murders that were committed with the same gun!"

FOR an instant, something flickered across Manny's pale eyes. Then it was gone.

"I think you're bluffin', copper!" he snapped. "And I never heard of nobody named Hargrave and don't know nothin' about no murders. I ain't sayin' no more till my lawyer gets here!"

"I wouldn't be too sure of that, Manny," Moody warned. "But it doesn't make any difference." To the plainclothesman, he said, "Bring Hargrave back in."

The cop brought Hargrave in again, and Moody looked triumphant.

"There he is, Manny. Don't you know him?"

"I never saw the monkey before in my life!"

"Yeah?" Moody chuckled. "Well, then, Mr. Ford, meet Mr. Hargrave— Mr. Hargrave, meet Mr. Ford!"

Moody leaned back in his chair.

"Gentlemen, I'm going to tell you a little story about murder! One which is unique in all my experience. A story of three murders committed by two sane people who, up till the time of their killings had never seen or even heard of their victims. Three murders committed completely without motive, but gaining their desired ends to perfection.

"That was what threw us off in each of these killings. There was one person in each case and only one whom we had reason to suspect. And in each case that one person made it a point to have an alibi that was absolutely beyond question.

"Oh, I'll admit you were smart, gentlemen ! You had the Department running around in circles for awhile. But you weren't quite smart enough!

"You each made one mistake, and those mistakes are going to be enough to get you both!"

He paused to light a fresh cigar. Manny and Hargrave were watching him intently.

"Your mistake, Hargrave, was in not destroying everything which ever could link you with the Calypso Club— even a couple of paper match books. You probably met Manny in the Calypso, learned somehow that you were both thinking murder and cooked up your scheme there."

HE SWUNG around to Manny Ford.

"Yours, Manny, was in using the same gun on Miller and Hargrave's wife that Hargrave had used on Big Bill Stendler. But for these two errors, Manny, you and Hargrave would not be here now. The idea was really good."

"And what gun were you referring to, Lieutenant?" inquired Hargrave politely.

"I thought you'd ask that, Hargrave," said Moody. "And I don't doubt that the gun is now sunk deep in the bottom of the East River. But Ballistics can prove that the same gun killed all three, and it was all we needed to set us on the right track!"

"And you now consider yourself on the right track," said Hargrave. "That's all nice theorizing, Lieutenant, but it takes proof, you know."

Moody's fingers drummed the desk.

"You were a little too smart for us, Hargrave. We haven't a shred of proof that you killed Bill Stendler. You covered your tracks well. But I'll bet you money, Hargrave, that you burn for it!"

He turned swiftly to Manny.

"As for you, Manny, we can absolutely prove to a jury that you killed Miller and Mrs. Hargrave!"

Manny Ford cringed a little, and there was fear in his eyes now.

"Fingerprints, Manny! You took great pains to wipe your prints off the door knobs and everything else in the murder room you touched. But you must be a clean soul, Manny. Because after you fired the gun, you went into the bathroom and carefully washed your hands in the basin. And what you forgot, Manny, was to wipe your prints off the water taps! Yours were the freshest there, Manny, and they're conclusive!"

Moody had scored. Manny took a backward, uncertain step, went very pale.

"It's a bluff, Manny!" Hargrave said sharply.

"No, Manny," said Moody, "it's not bluff, and you know it. You remember, now, washing up after the killing. So what will it be, Manny? Are you going to talk? Are you going to give us the whole story? Will you take a life sentence, Manny, with maybe a parole after twenty— or will it be the chair?"

Manny Ford wet his lips and stared out the window beyond Moody for a full minute, while Hargrave watched him in expressionless silence. Finally, he swallowed and turned.

"Okay, copper! You've got it! I'll talk!"

John Hargrave turned, took three steps and bolted through the window, nine stories above the street. Moody lost his bet on Hargrave burning in the chair.

A LITTLE later, Manny Ford was explaining everything.

"You had it figured just about straight, copper. He got me tight at the Calypso one night, and we got to talkin'. We both knew we'd be the first ones picked in each of our killin's, so we figured it out that he'd do my killin' just like I wanted it, and I'd do his, and each of us would fix a solid alibi for when the killin' came off.

"It was his idea— he musta heard how I felt about Stendler— and he put up the dough. It was a pretty good one, too, but—" Manny merely shrugged.

"But," Moody said, "it seems like murder needs a motive, after all!"

_____________

8: The Talking Horse

F. Anstey

(Thomas Anstey Guthrie 1856-1934)

1892

IT was on the way to Sandown Park that I met him first, on that horribly wet July afternoon when Bendigo won the Eclipse Stakes. He sat opposite to me in the train going down, and my attention was first attracted to him by the marked contrast between his appearance and his attire: he had not thought fit to adopt the regulation costume for such occasions, and I think I never saw a man who had made himself more aggressively horsey. The mark of the beast was sprinkled over his linen: he wore snaffle sleeve-links, a hard hunting-hat, a Newmarket coat, and extremely tight trousers. And with all this he fell as far short of the genuine sportsman as any stage super who ever wore his spurs upside down in a hunting chorus. His expression was mild and inoffensive, and his watery pale .eyes and receding chin gave one the idea that he was hardly to be trusted astride anything more spirited than a gold-headed cane. And yet, somehow, he aroused compassion rather than any sense of the ludicrous: he had the look of shrinking self-effacement which comes of a recent humiliation, and, in spite of all extravagances, he was obviously a gentleman; while something in his manner indicated that his natural tendency would, once at all events, have been to avoid any kind of extremes.

He puzzled and interested me so much that I did my best to enter into conversation with him, only to be baffled by the jerky embarrassment with which he met all advances, and when we got out at Esher, curiosity led me to keep him still in view.

Evidently he had not come with any intention of making money. He avoided the grandstand, with bookmakers huddling in couples, like hoarse lovebirds; he kept away from the members' inclosure, where the Guards' band was endeavouring to defy the elements Which emptied their vials into the brazen instruxnents; he drifted listlessly about the course till the clearing-bell rang and it seemed as if he was searching for some one whom he only wished to discover in order to avoid.

Sandown, it must be admitted, was not as gay as usual that day, with its "deluged park" and "unsummer'd sky," its waterproofed toilettes and massed umbrellas, whose sides gleamed livid as they caught the light— but there was a general determination to ignore the unseasonable dampness as far as possible, and an excitement over the main event of the day which no downpour could quench.

The Ten Thousand was run: ladies with marvellously confected bonnets lowered their umbrellas without a murmur, and sixuut men on drags shook hands effusively as, amidst a frantic roar of delight, Bendigo strode past the post. The moment after, I looked round for my incongruous stranger, and saw him engaged in a well-meant attempt to press a currant bun upon a carriage-horse tethered to one of the trees— a feat of abstraction which, at such a time, was only surpassed by that of Archimedes at the sack of Syracuse.

After that I could no longer control my curiosity— felt I must speak to him again, and I made an opportunity later, as we stood alone on a stand which commanded the finish of one of the shorter courses, by suggesting that he should share my umbrella.

Before accepting he glanced suspiciously at me through the rills that streamed from his unprotected hat-brim. "I'm afraid," I said, "it is rather like shutting the stable-door after the steed is stolen."

He started. "He was stolen, then," he cried; "so you have heard?"

I explained that I had only used an old proverb which I thought might appeal to him, and he sighed heavily.

"I was misled for the moment," he said: "you have guessed, then, that I have been accustomed to horses?"

"You have hardly made any great secret of it."

"The fact is," he said, instantly understanding this allusion to his costume, "I— I put on these things so as not to lose the habit of riding altogether— I have not been on horseback lately. At one time I used to ride constantly— constantly. I was a regular attendant in Rotten Row— until something occurred which shook my nerve, and I am only waiting now for the shock to subside."

I did not like to ask any questions, and we walked back to the station, and travelled up to Waterloo in company, without any further reference to the subject.

As we were parting, however, he said, "I wonder if you would care to hear my full story some day? I cannot help thinking it would interest you, and it would be a relief to me."

I was ready enough to hear whatever he chose to tell me; and persuaded him to dine with me at my rooms that evening, and unbosom himself afterwards, which he did to an extent for which I confess I was unprepared.

That he himself implicitly believed in his own story, I could not doubt ; and he told it throughout with the oddest mixture of vanity and modesty, and an obvious struggle between a dim perception of his own absurdity and the determination to spare himself in no single particular, which, though it did not overcome my scepticism, could not fail to enlist sympathy. But for all that, by the time he entered upon the more sensational part of his case, I was driven to form conclusions respecting it which, as they will probably force themselves upon the reader's own mind, I need not anticipate here.

I give the story, as far as possible, in the words of its author ; and have only to add that it would never have been published here without his full consent and approval.

MY NAME (said he), is Gustavus Pulvertoft. I have no occupation, and six hundred a year. I lived a quiet and contented bachelor until I was twenty-eight, and then I met Diana Chetwynd for the first time. We were spending Christmas at the same country-house, and it did not take me long to become the most devoted of her many adorers. She was one of the most variously accomplished girls I had ever met. She was a skilled musician, a brilliant amateur actress; she could give most men thirty out of a hundred at billiards, and her judgment and daring across the most difficult country had won her the warm admiration of all himting-men. And she was neither fast nor horsey, seeming to find but little pleasure in the society of mere sportsmen, to whose conversation she infinitely preferred that the persons who, like myself, were rather agreeable than athletic. I was not at that time. whatever I may be now, without my share of good looks, and for some reason it pleased Miss Chetwynd to show me a degree of favour which she accorded to no other member of thte house-party.

It was annoying to feel that my unfamiliarity with the open air sports in which she delighted debarred me from her company to so great an extent ; for it often happened that I scarcely saw her until the evening, when I sometimes had the bliss of sitting next to her at dinner; but on these occasions I could not help seeing that she found some pleasure in my society.

I don't think I have mentioned that, besides being exquisitely lovely, Diana was an heiress, and it was not without a sense of my own presumption that I allowed myself to entertain the hope of winning her at some future day. Still, I was not absolutely penniless, and she was her own mistress, and I had some cause, as I have said, for believing that she was, at least, not ill-disposed towards me. It seemed a favourable sign, for instance, when she asked me one day why it was I never rode. I replied that I had not ridden for years— though I did not add that the exact number of those years was twenty-eight.

"Oh, but you must take it up again!" she said, with the prettiest air of imperiousness. "You ought to ride in the Row next season."

"If I did," I said, "would you let me ride with you sometimes?"

"We should meet, of course," she said; "and it is such a pity not to keep up your riding— you lose so much by not doing so."

Was I wrong in taking this as an intimation that, by following her advice, I should not lose my reward? If you had seen her face as she spoke, you would have thought as I did then— as I do now.

And so, with this incentive, I overcame any private misgivings, and soon after my return to town attended a fashionable riding-school near Hyde Park, with the fixed determination to acquire the whole art and mystery of horsemanship.

That I found learning a pleasure I cannot conscientiously declare. I have passed happier hours than those I spent in cantering round four bare whitewashed walls on a snorting horse,

with my interdicted stirrups crossed upon the saddle. The riding-master informed me from time to time that I was getting on, and I knew instinctively when I was coming off; but I must have made some progress, for my instructor became more encouraging.

"Why, when you come here first, Mr. Pulvertoft, sir, you were like a pair o' tongs on a wall, as they say; whereas now— well, you can tell yourself how you are," he would say ; though, even then, I occasionally had reason to regret that I was not on a wall. However, I persevered, inspired by the thought that each fresh horse I crossed (and some were very fresh indeed) represented one more barrier surmounted between myself and Diana, and encouraged by the discovery, after repeated experiments, that tan was rather soothing to fall upon than otherwise.

When I walked in the Row, where a few horsemen were performing as harbingers of spring, I criticised their riding, which I thought indifferent, as they neglected nearly all the rules. I began to anticipate a day when I should exhibit a purer and more classic style of equestrianism. And one morning I saw Diana, who pulled up her dancing mare to ask me if I had remembered her advice, and I felt proudly able to reply that I should certainly make my appearance in the Row before very long.

From that day I was perpetually questioning my riding-master as to when he considered I should be ripe enough for Rotten Row. He was dubious, but not actually dissuasive.

"It's like this, you see, sir," he explained, "if you get hold of a quiet, steady horse— why, you won't come to no harm; but if you go out on an animal that will take advantage of you, Mr. Pulvertoft, why, you'll be all no-how on him, sir."

They would have mounted me at the school ; but I knew most of the stud there, and none of them quite came up to my ideal of a "quiet, steady horse"; so I went to a neighbouring job-master, from whom I had occasionally hired a brougham, and asked to be shown an animal he could recommend to one who had not had much practice lately. He admitted candidly enough that most of his horses "took a deal of riding," but added that it so happened that he had one just then which would suit me "down to the ground"— a phrase which grated unpleasantly on my nerves, though I consented to see the horse. His aspect impressed me most favourably. He was a chestnut of noble proportions, with a hogged mane; but what reassured me was the expression of his eye, indicating as it did a self-respect and sagacity which one would hardly expect for seven and sixpence an hour.

"You won't get a showier Park 'ack than what he is, not to be so quiet," said the owner. "He's what you may call a kind 'oss, and as gentle — you could ride him on a pack thread."

I considered reins safer, but I was powerfully drawn towards the horse; he seemed to me sensible that he had a character to lose, and to possess too high an intelligence wilfully to forfeit his testimonials. With hardly a second thought, I engaged him for the following afternoon.

I mounted at the stables, with just a passing qualm, perhaps, while my stirrup-leathers were being adjusted, and a little awkwardness in taking up my reins, which were more twisted than I could have wished ; however, at length, I found myself embarked on the stream of traffic on the back of the chestnut—whose name, by the way, was Brutus.

Shall I ever forget the pride and ecstasy of finding that I had my steed under perfect control, that we threaded the maze of carriages with absolute security? I turned him into the Park, and clucked my tongue: he broke into a canter, and how shall I describe my delight at the discovery that it was not uncomfortable? I said, "Woa," and he stopped, so gradually that my equilibrium was not seriously disturbed ; he trotted, and still I accommodated myself to his movements without any positive inconvenience. I could have embraced him for gratitude: never before had I been upon a beast whose paces were so easy, whose behaviour was so considerate. I could ride at last! or, which amounted to the same thing, I could ride the horse I was on, and I would use no other." I was about to meet Diana Chetwynd, and need not fear even to encounter her critical eyes.

We had crossed the Serpentine Bridge, and were just turning in upon the Ride, when— and here I am only too conscious that what I am about to say may strike you as almost incredible— when I heard an unfamiliar voice addressing me with, "I say— you!" and the moment afterwards realised that it proceeded from my own horse!

I am not ashamed to own that I was as nearly off as possible; for a more practised rider than I could pretend to be might have a difficulty in preserving his equanimity in this all but unparalleled sittiation. I was too much engaged in feeling for my left stirrup to make any reply, and presently the horse apoke once more. " I say," he inquired, and I failed to discern the slightest trace of respect in his tone— "do you think you can ride?"

You can judge for yourself how diconcerting the inquiry must have been from such lips. I felt rooted to. the saddle— a sensation which, with me, was sufficiently rare. I looked round in helpless bewilderment, at the shimmering Serpentine, and the white houses in Park Lane gleaming out of a lilac haze, at the cocoa-coloured Row, and the flash of distant carriage-wheels in the sunlight: all looked as usual— and yet, there was I on the bade of a horse which had just inquired "whether I thought I could ride"!

"I have had two dozen lessons at a riding-school," I said at last, with rather a flabby dignity.

"I should hardly have suspected it," was his brutal retort. "You are evidently one of the hopeless cases."

I was deeply hurt, the more so because I could not deny that he had some claim to be a judge. "I— I thought we were getting on so nicely together," I faltered, and all he said in reply to that was, "Did you?"

" Do you know," I began, striving to be conversational, " I never was on a horse that talked before."

"You are enough to make any horse talk," he answered; "but I suppose I am an exception."

"I think you must be," said I. "The only horses I ever heard of as possessing the gift of speech were the Houyhnhnms."

"How do you know I am not one of them?" he replied.

"If you are, you will understand that I took the liberty of mounting you under a very pardonable mistake; and if you will have the goodness to stand still, I will no longer detain you."

"Not so fast," said he: " I want to know something more about you first. I should say now you were a man with plenty of oats."

"I am— well off," I said. How I wished I was!

"I have long been looking out for a proprietor who would not overwork me: now, of course, I don't know, but you scarcely strike me as a hard rider."

"I do not think I could be fairly accused of that," I answered, with all the consciousness of innocence.

"Just so— then buy me."

"No," I gasped: "after the extremely candid opinion you were good enough to express of my riding, I'm surprised that you should even suggest such a thing."

"Oh, I will put up with that— you will suit me well enough, I dare say."

"You must excuse me. I prefer to keep my spare cash for worthier objects ; and, with your permission, I will spend the remainder of the afternoon on foot."

"You will do nothing of the sort," said he.

"If you won't stop, and let me get off properly," I said, with firmess, " I shall roll off." There were some promenaders within easy hail; but how was I to word a call for help, how explain such a dilemma as mine?

"You will only reduce me to the painful necessity of rolling on you," he replied. "You must see that you are to a certain extent in my power. Suppose it occurred to me to leap those rails and take you into the Serpentine, or to run away and upset a mounted policeman with you— do you think you could offer much opposition?"

I could not honestly assert that I did. "You were introduced to me," I said reproachfully, "as a kind horse!"

"And so I am— apart from matters of business. Come, will you buy, or be bolted with? I hate indecision! "

"Buy!" I said, with commercial promptness. "If you will take me back, I will arrange about it at once."

It is needless to say that my own idea was to get safely off his back: after which, neither honour nor law could require me to execute a contract extorted from me by threats. But, as we were going down the mews, he said reflectively, "I've been thinking— it will be better for all parties, if you make your offer to my proprietor before you dismount." I was too vexed to speak: this animal's infernal intelligence had foreseen my manoeuvre— he meant to foil it, if he could.

And then we clattered in under the glass-roofed yard of the livery stables ; and the job-master, who was alone there, cast his eyes up at the sickly-faced clock, as if he were comparing its pallor with my own. "Why, you are home early, sir," he said. " You didn't find the 'orse too much for you, did you?"

He said this without any suspicion of the real truth; and, indeed, I may eacy, once for all, that this weird horse— Houyhnhnm, or whatever else he might be— admitted no one but myself into the secret of his marvellous gifts, and in all his conversations with me, managed though how, I cannot pretend to si^) to avoid being overheard.

"Oh, dear no," I protested, " he carried me admirably— admirably!" and I madean attempt to slip off.

No such thing: Brutus instantly jogged my memory, and me; by the slightest suggestion of a "buck."

"He's a grand 'orse, sir, isn't he ? " said the job master complacently.

"M— magnificent!" I agreed, with a jerk. "Will you go to his head, please?"

But the horse backed into the centre of the yard, where he plunged with a quiet obstinacy. "I like him so much," I called out, as I clung to the saddle, "that I want to know if you're at all inclined to part with him?" Here Brutus became calm and attentive.

"Would you be inclined to make me a orfer for him, sir?"

"Yes," I said faintly. "About how much would he be?"

"You step into my orfice here, sir," said he, "and we'll talk it over."

I should have been only too willing, for there was no room there for the horse, but the suspicious animal would not hear of it: he began to revolve immediately.

"Let us settle it now— here," I said, " I can't wait."

The job-master stroked away a grin. No doubt there was something unbusinesslike and unpractical in such precipitation, especially as combined with my appearance at the time.

"Well, you 'ave took a violent fancy to the 'orse and no mistake, sir," he remarked.

"I never crossed a handsomer creature," I said; which was hardly a prudent remark for an intending purchaser, but fhen, there was the animal himself to be conciliated.

"I don't know, really, as I can do without him just at this time of year," said the man. "I'm under'orsed as it is for the work I've got to do."

A sweet relief stole over me: I had done all that could be expected of me. "I'm very sorry to hear that," I said, preparing to dismount. "That is a disappointment ; but if you can't, there's an end of it."

"Don't you be afraid," said Brutus, "he'll sell me readily enough: make him an offer, quick!"

"I'll give you thirty guineas for him, come!" I said, knowing well enough that he would not take twice the money.

"I thought a gentleman like you would have had more insight into the value of a 'orse,"he said; "why, his action alone is worth that, sir."

"You couldn't let me have the action without the horse, I suppose?" I said, and I must have intended some joke.

It is unnecessary to prolong a painful scene. Brutus ran me up steadily from sum to sum, until his owner said at last: "Well, we won't 'aggle, sir, call it a hundred."

I had to call it a hundred, and what is more, it was a hundred. I took him without a warranty, without even a veterinary opinion. I could have been induced to take my purchase away then and there, as if I had been buying a canary, so unaccustomed was I to transactions of this kind, and I am afraid the job-master considered me little better than a fool.

So I found myself the involuntary possessor of a Houyhnhnm, or something even worse, and I walked back to my rooms in Park Street in a state of stupor. What was I to do with him? To ride an animal so brutally plainspoken would be a continual penance; and yet, I should have to keep him, for I knew he was cunning enough to outwit any attempt to dispose of him. And to this, Love and Ambition had led me! I could not, after all I had said, approach Diana with any confidence as a mere pedestrian: the fact that I was in possession of a healthy horse which I never rode, would be sure to leak out in time, and how was I to account for it? I could see no way, and I groaned under an embarrassment which I dared not confide to the friendliest ear. I hated the monster that had saddled himself upon me, and looked in vain for any mode of escape.

I had to provide Brutus with stabling in another part of the town, for he proved exceedingly difficult to please: he found fault with everything, and I only wonder he did not demand that his stable should be fitted up with blue china and mezzotints. In his new quarters I left him for some days to his own devices : a course which I was glad to find, on visiting him again, had considerably reduced his arrogance. He wanted to go in the Row and see the other horses, and it did not at all meet his views to be exercised there by a stableman at unfashionable hours. So he proposed a compromise. If I would only consent to mount him, he engaged to treat me with forbearance, and pointed out that he could give me, as he expressed it, various " tips " which would improve my seat. I was not blind to the advantages of such an arrangement. It is not everyone who secures a riding-master in the person of his own horse ; the horse is essentially a generous animal, and I felt that I might trust to Brutus's honour. And to do him justice, he observed the compact with strict good faith. Some of his " tips," it is true, very nearly tipped me off, but their result was to bring us closer together ; our relations were less strained ; it seemed to me that I gained more mastery over him every day, and was less stiff afterwards.

But I was not allowed to enjoy this illusion long. One day when I innocently asked him if he found my hands improving, he turned upon me his off sardonic eye. "You'll never improve, old saw-of-beans" (for he had come to address me with a freedom I burned to resent); "hands! why, you're sawing my mouth off all the time. And your feet ‘home,' and tickling me under my shoulders at every stride— why, I'm half ashamed to be seen about with you."

I was deeply hurt. "I will spare you for the future," I said coldly; "this is my last appearance."

"Nonsense," he said, "you needn't show temper over it. Surely, if I can put up with it, you can! But we will make a new compact." (I never knew such a beast as he was for bargains !) "You only worry me by interfering with the reins. Let 'em out, and leave everything to me. Just mention from time to time where you want to go, and I'll attend to it,— if I've nothing better to do."

I felt that such an understanding was destructive of all dignity, subverting, as it did, the natural relations between horse and rider; but I had hardly any self-respect left, and I consented, since I saw no way of refusing. And on the whole, I cannot say, even now, that I had any grave reason for finding fault with tbe use Brutus made of my concessions; he showed more tact than I could have expected in disguising the merely nominal nature of my authority.

I had only one serious complaint against him, which was that he had a habit of breaking suddenly away, with a merely formal apology, to exchange equine civilities with some cob or mare, to whose owner I was a perfect stranger, thus driving me to invent the most desperate excuses to cover my seeming intrusion : but I managed to account for it in various ways, and even made a few acquaintances in this irregular and involuntary manner. I could have wished he had been a less susceptible animal, for, though his flirtations were merely Platonic, it is rather humiliating to have to play "gooseberry" to one's own horse— a part which I was constantly being called upon to perform !

As it happened, Diana vras away in Paris that Easter, and we had not met since ray appearance in the Row; but I knew she would be in town again shortly, and with consummate diplomacy I began to excite Brutus's curiosity by sundry careless, half-slighting allusions to Miss Chetwynd's little mare, Wild Rose. "She's too frisky for my taste," I said, "but she's been a good deal admired, though I dare say you wouldn't be particularly struck by her."

So that, on the first afternoon of Diana's return to the Row, I found it easy, under cover of giving Brutus an opportunity of forming an opinion, to prevail on him to carry me to her side. Diana, who was with a certain Lady Verney, her chaperon, welcomed me with a charming smile.

"I had no idea you could ride so well," she said, "you manage that beautiful horse of yours so very easily— with such light hands, too."

This was not irony, for I could now give my whole mind to my seat ; and, as I never interfered at all with the steering apparatus, my hands must have seemed the perfection of lightness.

"He wants delicate handling," I answered carelessly, " but he goes very well with me."

"I wish you would let me try his paces some morning, Pulvertoft," struck in a Colonel Cockshott, who was riding with them, and whom 1 knew slightly ; " I've a notion he would go better on the curb."

"I shall be very happy," I began, when, just in time, I noticed a warning depression in Brutus's ears. The Colonel rode about sixteen stone, and with spurs!

"I mean," I added hastily, " I should have been— only, to tell you the truth, I couldn't conscientiously trust anyone on him but myself."

"My dear fellow!" said the Colonel, who I could see was offended, "I've not met many horses in my time that I couldn't get upon terms with."

"I think Mr. Pulvertoft is quite right," said Diana. "When a horse gets accustomed to one he does so resent a strange hand; it spoils his temper for days. I never will lend Wild Rose to anybody for that very reason I "

The Colonel fell back in the rear in a decided sulk. "Poor dear Colonel Cockshott!" said Diana, "he is so proud of his riding, but I think he dragoons a horse. I don't call that riding, do you?"

"Well— hardly," I agreed, with easy disparagement. "I never believe in ruling a horse by fear."

"I suppose you are very fond of yours?" she said.

"Fond is not the word!" I exclaimed — and it certainly was not.

"I am not sure that what I said about lending Wild Rose would apply to you" she said. "I think you would be gentle with her."

I was certain that I should treat her with all consideration; but as I doubted whether she would wholly reciprocate it, I said with much presence of mind, that I should regard riding her as akin to profanation.

As Brutus and I were going home, he observed that it was a good thing I had not agreed to lend him to the Colonel.

"Yes," I said, determined to improve the occasion, "you might not have found him as considerate as— well, as some people!"

"I meant it was a good thing for you!" he hinted darkly, and I did not care to ask for an explanation. " What did you mean," he resumed, " by saying that I should not admire Wild Rose? Why, she is charming— charming!"

"In that case," I said, "I don't mind riding with her mistress occasionally — to oblige you."

"You don't mind!" he said; "you will have to, my boy,— and every afternoon!"

I suppressed a chuckle: after all, man is the nobler animal. I could manage a horse— in my own way. My little ruse had succeeded: I should have no more forced introductions to mystified strangers.

And now for some weeks my life passed in a happy dream. I only lived for those hours in the Row, where Brutus turned as naturally to Wild Rose as the sunflower to the sun, and Diana and I grew more intimate every day. Happiness and security made me almost witty. I was merciless in my raillery of the eccentric exhibitions of horsemanship which were to be met with, and Diana was provoked by my comments to the sweetest silvery laughter. As for Colonel Cockshott, whom

I had once suspected of a desire to be my rival, he had long become a "negligible quantity"; and if I delayed in asking Diana to trust me with her sweet self, it was only because I found an epicurean pleasure in prolonging a suspense that was so little uncertain.

And then, without warning, my riding was interrupted for a while. Brutus was discovered, ynuch to his annoyance, to have a saddle-raw, and was even so unjust as to lay the blame on me, though, for my own part, I thought it a mark of apt, though tardy, retribution. I was not disposed to tempt Fortune upon any other mount, but I couId not keep away from the Row, nevertheless, and appeared there on foot. I saw Diana riding with the Colonel, who seemed to think his opportunity had come at last ; but whenever she passed the railings on which I leaned, she would raise her eyebrows and draw her mouth down into a little curve of resigned boredom, which completely reassured me. Still, I was very glad when Brutus was well again, and we were cantering down the Row once more, both in the highest spirits.

"I never heard the horses here whinny so much as they do this season," I said, by way of making conversation. "Can you account for it at all?" For he sometimes gave me pieces of information which enabled me to impress Diana afterwards by my intimate knowledge of horses.

"Whinnying?" he said. "They're laughing, that's what they're doing— and no wonder!"

"Oh! " said I, " and what's the joke?"

"Why, you are!" he replied. "You don't suppose you take them in, do you? They know all about you, bless your heart!"

"Oh, do they?" I said blankly. This brute took a positive pleasure, I believe, in reducing my self-esteem.

"I dare say it has got about through Wild Rose," he continued. "She was immensely tickled when I told her. I'm afraid she must have been feeling rather dull all these days, by the by."

I felt an unworthy impulse to take his conceit down as he had lowered mine.

"Not so very, I think," I said. "She seemed to me to find that brown hunter of Colonel Cockshott's a very agreeable substitute."

Late as it is for reparation, I must acknowledge with shame that in uttering this insinuation, I did that poor little mare (for whom I entertained the highest respect) a shameful injustice ; and I should like to state here, in the most solemn and emphatic manner, my sincere belief that, from first to last, she conducted herself in a manner that should have shielded her from all calumny.

It was only a mean desire to retaliate, a petty and ignoble spite, that prompted me thus to poison Brutus's confidence, and I regretted the words as soon as I had uttered them.

"That beast!" he said, starting as if I had touched him with a whip— a thing I never used— "why, he hasn't two ideas in his great fiddle-head. The only sort of officer he ought to carry is a Salvationist!"

"I grant he has not your personal advantages and charm of manner," I said. "No doubt I was wrong to say anything about it."

"No," he said, " you— you have done me a service," and he relapsed into a sombre silence.

I was riding with Diana as usual, and was about to express my delight at being able to resume our companionship, when her mare drew slightly ahead and lashed out suddenly, catching me on the left leg, and causing intense agony for the moment.

Diana showed the sweetest concern, imploring me to go home in a cab at once, while her groom took charge of Brutus.

I declined the cab ; but, as my leg was really painful, and Brutus was showing an impatience I dared not disregard, I had to leave her side.

On our way home, Brutus said moodily, "It is all over between us— you saw that?"

"I felt it!" I replied. "She nearly broke my leg."

"It was intended for me," he said. "It was her way of signifying that we had better be strangers for the future. I taxed her with her faithlessness; she denied it, of course— every mare does; we had an explanation, and everything is at an end!"

I did not ride him again for some days, and when I did, I found him steeped in Byronic gloom. He even wanted at first to keep entirely on the Bayswater side of the Park, though I succeeded in arguing him out of such weakness. "Be a horse!" I said. "Show her you don't care. You only flatter her by betraying your feelings."

This was a subtlety that had evidently not occurred to him, but he was intelligent enough to feel the force of what I said. "You are right," he admitted; "you are not quite a fool in some respects. She shall see how little I care!"

Naturally, after this, I expected to accompany Diana as usual, and it was a bitter disappointment to me to find that Brutus would not hear of doing so. He had an old acquaintance in the Park, a dapple-grey, who, probably from some early disappointment, was a confirmed cynic, and whose society he thought would be congenial just men. The grey was ridden regularly by a certain Miss Gittens, whose appearance as she titupped laboriously up and down had often furnished Diana and myself with amusement.

And now, in spite of all my efforts, Brutus made straight to the grey. I was not in such difficulties as might have been expected, for I happened to know Miss Gittens slightly, as a lady no longer in the bloom of youth, who still retained a wiry form of girlishness. Though rather disliking her than not, I found it necessary just then to throw some slight effusion into my greetings. She, not unnaturally, perhaps, was flattered by my preference, and begged me to give her a little instruction in riding, which— Heaven forgive me for it!— I took upon myself to do.

Even now I scarcely see how I could have acted otherwise: I could not leave her side until Brutus had exhausted the pleasures of cynicism with his grey friend, and the time had to be filled up somehow. But, oh, the torture of seeing Diana at a distance, and knowing that only a miserable misunderstanding between our respective steeds kept us apart, feeling constrained even to avoid looking in her direction, lest she should summon me to her side!

One day, as I was riding with Miss Gittens, she glanced coyly at me over her sharp right shoulder, and said, " Do you know, only such a little while ago, I never even dreamed that we should ever become as intimate as we are now ; it seems almost incredible, does it not?"

"You must not say so," I replied. "Surely there is nothing singular in my helping you a little with your riding?"

Though it struck me that it would have been very singular if I had.

"Perhaps not singular," she murmured, looking modestly down her nose; "but will you think me very unmaidenly if I confess that, to me, those lessons have developed a dawning danger?"

"You are perfectly safe on the grey," I said.

"I— I was not thinking of the grey," she returned. " Dear Mr, Pulvertoft, I must speak frankly— a girl has so many things to consider, and I am afraid you have made me forget how wrongly and thoughtlessly I have been behaving of late. I cannot help suspecting that you must have some motive in seeking my society in so— so marked a manner."

"Miss Gittens," said I, "I can disguise nothing: I have."

"And you have not been merely amusing vourself all this time?"

"Before Heaven," I cried with fervour, "I have not!"

"You are not one of those false men who give their bridle-reins a shake, and ride off with 'Adieu for evermore!' —tell me you are not?"

I might shake my bridle-reins till I was tired and nothing would come of it unless Brutus was in the humour to depart; so that I was able to assure her with truth that I was not at all that kind of person.

"Then why not let your heart speak?"

"There is such a thing," I said gloomily, " as a heart that is gagged."

"Can no word, no hint of mine loosen the gag?" she wished to know. "What, you are silent still? Then, Mr. Pulvertoft, though I may seem harsh and cruel in saying it, our pleasant intercourse must end—we must ride together no more!"

No more? What would Brutus say to that ? I was horrified. "Miss Gittens," I said in great agitation, "I entreat you to unsay those words. I— I am afraid I could not undertake to accept such a dismissal. Surely, after that, you will not insist!"

She sighed. "I am a weak, foolish girl," she said; "you are only too able to overcome my judgment. Then, Mr. Pulvertoft, look happy again — I relent. You may stay if you will!"

You must believe that I felt thoroughly ashamed of myself, for I could not be blind to the encouragement which, though I sought to confine my words to strict truth, I was innocently affording. But, with a horse like mine, what was a man to do ? What would you have done yourself ? As soon as was prudent, I hinted to Brutus that his confidences had lasted long enough ; and as he trotted away with me, he remarked, "I thought you were never going." Was he weary of the grey already?

My heart leaped.

"Brutus," I said thickly, "are you strong enough to bear a great joy?"

"Speak out," he said, "and do try to keep those heels out of my ribs."

"I cannot see you suffer," I told him, with a sense of my own hypocrisy all the time. "I must tell you— circumstances have come to my knowledge which lead me to believe that we have both judged Wild Rose too hastily. I am sure that her heart is yours still. She is only longing to tell you that she has never really swerved from her allegiance."

"It is too late now," he said, and the back of his head looked inflexibly obstinate; "we have kept apart too long."

"No," I said, "listen. I the more interest in you than you are, perhaps, aware of, and I have thought of a little plan for bringing you together again. What if I find an opportunity to see the lady she belongs to— we have not met lately, as you know, and I do not pretend that I desire a renewal of our intimacy "

"You like the one on the grey best; I saw that long ago," he said ; and I left him in his error.

"In any case, for your sake, I will sacrifice myself," I said magnanimously. "I will begin to-morrow. Come, you will not let your lives be wrecked by a foolish lovers' quarrel?"

He made a little half-hearted opposition, but finally, as I knew he would, consented. I had gained my point: I was free from Miss Gittens at last !

That evening I met Diana in the hall of a house in Eaton Square. She was going downstairs as I was making my way to the ball-room, and greeted me with a rather cool little nod.

"You have quite deserted me lately," she said, smiling, but I could read the reproach in her eyes, "you never ride with us now."

My throat was swelling with passionate eloquence— and I could not get any of it out.

"No, I never do," was all my stupid tongue could find to say.

"You have discovered a more congenial companion," said cruel Diana.

"Miss Chetwynd," I said eagerly, "you don't know how I have been wishing! Will you let me ride with you to-morrow, as— as you used to do?"

"You are quite sure you won't be afraid of my naughty Wild Rose? "she said. "I have given her such a scolding, that I think she is thoroughly ashamed of herself."

"You thought it was thay that kept me!" I cried. "Oh, if I could tell you!"

She smiled : she was my dear, friendly Diana again.

"You shall tell me all about it to-morrow," she said. "You will not have another opportunity, because we are going to Aix on Friday. And now, good-night. I am stopping the way, and the linkman is getting quite excited over it."

She passed on, and the carriage rolled away with her, and I was too happy to mind very much— had she not forgiven me? Should we not meet to-morrow ? I should have two whole hours to declare myself in, and this time I would dally with Fortune no longer.

How excited I was the following day: how fearful, when the morning broke grey and lowering : how grateful, when the benignant sun shone out later, and promised a brilliant afternoon: how careful I dressed, and what a price I paid for the flower for my buttonhole!

So we cantered on to the Row, as goodly a couple (if I may be pardoned this retrospective vanity) as any there; and by and by, I saw, with the quick eye of a lover, Diana's willowy form in the distance. She was not alone, but I knew that the Colonel would soon have to yield his place to me.

As soon as she saw me, she urged her mare to a trot, and came towards me with the loveliest faint blush and dawning smile of welcome, when, all at once, Brutus came to a dead stop, which nearly threw me on his neck, and stood quivering in every limb.

"Do you see that?" he said hoarsely. "And I was about to forgive her!"

I saw my insinuation, baseless enough at the beginning, was now but too well justified. Colonel Cockshott was on his raw-boned brown hunter, and even my brief acquaintance with horses enabled me to see that Wild Rose no longer regarded him with her former indifference.

Diana and the Colonel had reigned up and seemed waiting for me— would Brutus never move? " Show your pride," I said in an agonised whisper. "Treat her with the contempt she deserves!"

"I will," he said between his bit and clenched teeth.

And then Miss Gittens came bumping by on the grey, and, before I could interfere, my Houyhnhnm was off like a shot in pursuit. I saw Diana's sweet, surprised face : I heard the Colonel's jarring laugh as I passed, and I— I could only bow in mortified appeal, and long for a gulf to leap into like Curtius !

I don't know what I said to Miss Gittens. I believe I

made myself recklessly amiable, and I remember she lingered over parting in a horrible emotional manner. I was too miserable to mind: all the time I was seeing Diana's astonished eyes, hearing Colonel Cockshott's heartless laugh. Brutus made a kind of explanation on our way home: "You meant well," he said, "but you see you were wrong. Your proposed sacrifice, for which I am just as grateful to you as if it had been effected, was useless. All I could do in return was to take you where your true inclination lay. I, too, can be unselfish."

I was too dejected to curse his unselfishness. I did not even trouble myself to explain what it had probably cost me. I only felt drearily that I had had my last ride, I had had enough horsemanship for ever!

That evening I went to the theatre, I wanted to deaden thought for the moment; and during one of the intervals I saw Lady Verney in the stalls, and went up to speak to her. "Your niece is not with you?" I said; "I thought I should have had a chance of— of saying goodbye to her before she left for the continent."

I had a lingering hope that she might ask me to lunch, that I might have one more opportunity of explaining.

"Oh," said Lady Verney, "but that is all changed; we are not going— at least, not yet."

"Not going!" I cried, incredulous for very joy.

"No, it is all very sudden; but— well, you are almost like an old friend, and you are sure to hear it sooner or later, I only knew myself this afternoon, when she came in from her ride. Colonel Cockshott has proposed and she has accepted him. We're so pleased about it. Wasn't dear Mrs. —— delightful in that last act? I positively saw real tears on her face!"

If I had waited much longer she would have seen a similar display of realism on mine. But I went back and sat the interval out, and listened critically to the classical selection of chamber-music from the orchestra, and saw the rest of the play, though I have no notion how it ended.

All that night my heart was slowly consumed by a dull rage that grew with every sleepless hour; but the object of my resentment was not Diana. She had only done what as a woman she was amply justified in doing after the pointed slight I had apparently inflicted upon her. Her punishment was sufficient already, for, of course, I guessed that she had only accepted the Colonel under the first intolerable sting of desertion. No: I reserved all my wrath for Brutus, who had betrayed me at the moment of triumph. I planned revenge. Cost what it might I would ride him once more. In the eyes of the law I was his master. I would exercise my legal rights to the full.

The afternoon came at last. I was in a white heat of anger, though as I ascended to the saddle there were bystanders who put a more uncharitable construction upon my complexion.

Brutus cast an uneasy eye at my heels as we started: "What are those things you've got on?" he inquired.

"Spurs," I replied curtly.

"You shouldn't wear them till you have learnt to turn your toes in," he said. " And a whip, too! May I ask what that is for?"

"We will discuss that presently," I said very coldly; for I did not want to have a scene with my horse in the street.

When we came round by the statue of Achilles and on to the Ride, I shortened my reins, and got a better hold of the whip, while I found that, from some cause I cannot explain, the roof of my mouth grew uncomfortably dry.

"I shall be glad of a little quiet talk with you, if you've no objection," I began.

"I am quite at your disposal," he said, champing his bit with a touch of irony.

"First, let me tell you," I said, " that I have lost my only love for ever."

"Well," he retorted flippantly, "you won't die of it. So have I. We must endeavour to console one another!"

I still maintained a deadly calm. "You seem unaware that you are the sole cause of my calamity," I said. "Had you only consented to face Wild Rose yesterday, I should have been a happy man by this time!"

"How was I to know that, when you let me think all your affections were given to the elderly thing who is trotted out by my friend the grey?"

"We won't argue, please," I said hastily. "It is enough that your infernal egotism and self-will have ruined my happiness. I have allowed you to usurp the rule, to reverse our natural positions. I shall do so no more. I intend to teach you a lesson you will never forget."

For a horse, he certainly had a keen sense of humour. I thought the girths would have snapped.

"And when do you intend to begin?" he asked, as soon as he could speak.

I looked in front of me : there were Diana and her accepted lover riding towards us ; and so natural is dissimulation, even to the sweetest and best women, that no one would have suspected from her radiant face that her gaiety covered an aching heart.

"I intend to begin now!" I said. "Monster, demon, whatever you are that have held me in thrall so long, I have broken my chains! I have been a coward long enough. You may kill me if you like. I rather hope you will; but first I mean to pay you back some of the humiliation with which you have loaded me. I intend to thrash you as long as I remain in the saddle."

I have been told by eye-witnesses that the chastisement was of brief duration, but while it lasted, I flatter myself, it was severe. I laid into him with a stout whip, of whose effectiveness I had assured myself by experiments upon my own legs. I dug my borrowed spurs into his flanks. I jerked his mouth. I dare say he was almost as much surprised as pained. But he was pained!

I was about to continue my practical rebuke, when my victim suddenly evaded my grasp; and for one vivid second I seemed to be gazing upon a bird's-eye view of his back; and then there was a crash, and I lay, buzzing like a bee, in an iridescent fog, and each colour meant a different pain, and they faded at last into darkness, and I remember no more.

"IT WAS weeks," concluded Mr. Pulvertoft, "before the darkness lifted and revealed me to myself as a strapped and bandaged invalid. But— and this is perhaps the most curious part of my narrative— almost the first sounds that reached my ears were those of wedding bells; and I knew, without requiring to be told, that they were ringing for Diana's marriage with the Colonel. That showed there wasn't much the matter with me, didn't it? Why, I can hear them everywhere now. I don't think she ought to have had them rung at Sandown though: it was just a little ostentatious, so long after the ceremony; don't you think so?"

"Yes— yes," I said; "but you never told me what became of the horse."

"Ah! the horse— yes. I am looking for him. I'm not so angry with him as I was, and I don't like to ask too many questions at the stables, for fear they may tell me one day that they had to shoot him while I was so ill. You knew I was ill, I dare say—" he broke off: "—there were bulletins about me in the papers. Look here."

He handed me a cutting on which I read:

"The Recent Accident in Rotten Row.

There is no change as yet in Mr. Pulvertoft's condition. The unfortunate gentleman is still lying unconscious at his rooms in Park Street; and his medical attendants fear that, even if he recovers his physical strength, the brain will be permanently injured."

"But that was all nonsense!" said Mr. Pulvertoft, with a little nervous laugh, "it wasn't injured a bit, or how could I remember everything so clearly as I do, you know?"

And this was an argument that was, or course, unanswerable.

___________________

One of the "FreeLances in Diplomacy" series

9: A Night in the Kremlin

Clarence Herbert New

1862-1933

Blue Book, May 1924

THE place had been once the drawing-room of a baroness, in the old regime; its marquetry floors had been covered with almost priceless rugs from Persia, Bokhara, Kashmir, its walls hung with Verestchagin's and Muncaczy's best work. But some of the pictures had been ripped to shreds by a freezing mob intent upon using the frames as firewood; the floors had been gouged and splintered, and most of the rugs sold for bread by servants who dared ask no more than a few rubles lest they be shot by the Cheka as bourgeoisie. Two of them, soiled and tattered, were used for extra warmth over the straw in a couple of bins roughly knocked together for beds by men who handled a pen much better than they did carpenter's tools— and yet, with thorough but gentle cleaning, each of those Persian carpet fragments would have sold in the United States for a thousand dollars.

Window-casings— almost every article made of wood— had been long since burned. The wall-frescoing had been smudged and streaked with dirt, every bit of lead pipe in the house long since removed. In the center of the room stood an old-type German stove, in which burned a few chunks of coal that had come up from the Nijni-Novgorod district in the summer months. Across the window-apertures two thicknesses of sacking had been stretched. By the stove one was conscious of a faint warmth in front, but had to depend upon the thickness of his clothes to protect the other side of him. Because even mob ideas of the simple life must give way eventually to the howling of tired, aching muscles, four chairs had been constructed by a sailor from Odessa who was handy with tools, and glad to spend a few days on the work in exchange for more or less immunity from the prowling hyenas of the Cheka. (Sawed lumber had been dribbling into Moscow from the nearer forested districts where German gang-bosses were getting the stuff out as best they could.)

The man who squatted, cross-legged, in the straw of a bunk near the stove, picked bits of very beautifuLmusic from a bala¬ laika while he hummed an obbligato in a pleasing baritone not loud enough to get beyond the sacking in the front windows. For the moment, he had more sense of bodily comfort than either of his guests— thanks to the quart of champagne they had generously fetched in from a restaurant at a price which would have been classed under "burglary" in the annals of crime. He was a man of fifty, not quite as emaciated, as he had been during '20 and '21, perceptibly less dirty as to face and hands, a degree or two more presentable in his boots and wadded coat, with its astrakhan collar. The other two were not really suffering, you understand— but only because they were men of iron constitution, accustomed to severe exposure and privations at times. But you couldn't have converted them to an acceptance of the life which Russians were finding at least tolerable had you offered either one a million, gold, to remain in the country a single year. Both were almost unmistakably German, with that manner of command which marks the army officer or the manager of large industries. They might have been of the old nobility— or of the more politic class evolved in big business. And they had come to Kravotkin with letters from a man in Paris to whom Russians were turning with considerable hope since the death of Lenine.

"Ach, Gott, Kravotkin! Do you know what you are playing, man! The ‘Venetian Love-song' of Nevin— in a temperature like this, with the wind blowing through like a knife! It iss not appropriate—nein! We've not heard you play much of your Russian music—why iss that?"

THE Russian switched without stopping into the little "Polonaise Brillante"— one of the most charming things ever done in his country. After a few bars, he stopped abruptly with a crashing chord across the strings.

"You know that— eh? It was written by Andreyef— conductor of the Imperial Balalaika Orchestra which used to play at every court affair. He took his orchestra through Europe, through America, playing before great audiences. Made records for the big phonograph companies. A man of good family and great talent. Do you know what these swine did to him? Threw this artist, this gifted countryman of theirs, into a filthy and freezing cellar! Let him starve to death there! Sometimes, my friend— one is not in the mood to play Russian music. It suggests too much!"

"But—conditions are not quite so bad as they were, I think?"

"Not quite. Lenine is dead. In his bed— which is like an anticlimax! None of us expected it that way. The man had enemies— naturally. But even he had brains enough to profit by experience, he said openly that, with human nature in its present state, a communistic world was impossible, that we must return to the capitalistic system until there was a change, at least. And from that time, there has been improvement— of a sort.

"It is merely a beginning, so far— a promise of better things to come. This room, you observe, is not the place I could have wished in which to receive you. The hotel, where you would be much less safe, is warmer and more comfortably furnished at least. But the day is only beginning to break for Russia. There is still too much shooting in filthy cellars— because the opposition is known to be getting stronger every week. A stronger Kerensky would find his opportunity almost ripe. It may be that the upheaval will be almost bloodless; the whole country is weary of bloodshed and ruin and filth."

"Er— you found our man, Spielmeyer, without much difficulty?"

"Yes. He has brains— that one! When his newspaper, Moskauer Zeitung, was taken over by the Soviet to print ruble-sheets and propaganda, he went to the Kremlin and insisted upon an interview with Lenine. The Red Guard would have bayoneted him if Lenine himself hadn't come out, then, just by luck. Spielmeyer said, in few words, that he wanted to run the Moskauer Zeitung under Lenine's orders, any way he wanted it run— knew the whole plant better than anyone else. So he was kept on, there, with a part of his operating force. Today he is allowed to get out a semi-weekly newspaper and collect what advertising he can to run it, but the presses are used more than half the time for Soviet work."

"You were careful not to give him my name, Kravotkin?"

"As you requested. Of course! I said you were a representative of the Internationale Pressbund which owned the paper in the old days of the Empire. He asked me to describe you— nodded his head, when I did so in a general way. He should be here now, almost any time."

IN a few moments, there came a pounding upon the door below— and when the Russian had gone down to unbar it, a stocky man with a blonde beard and blue eyes, peering from behind thick lenses, climbed the stairs to where they were sitting. In the none too good lamplight— the electric fittings having been long since ripped out—he peered searchingly into the faces of the two strangers. Then expressions of incredulity and delight flashed across his face as he grasped their hands with both of his.

"Ach! Du lieber Gott! Der Herr Doktor Liebknecht himself— and the good Von Bergmann!"

He had spoken in Russian with a strong German accent— had never been suspected of being other than what he seemed, a very well-educated Wurttemberger. But in other times and places, the man was the Honorable John Sheldon of Hants, England. Moreover he knew "Dr. Liebknecht" for none other than Earl Trevor, foremost of the famous Free Lances in Diplomacy, and his secret employer. And "Von Bergmann" was Trevor's Afghan right-hand man Abdool.

"I couldn't imagine who, of the old crowd, might be left to come out here as the Syndicate representatives, knowing of course that we had been merged with the International since the war," pursued "Spielmeyer."

"Well— presumably you know, sir, about what condition our plants are in and generally, what has happened to us. The only definite information I can give you is concerning Brausch and Soldermann. Their papers in Saratov and Kiev were taken over by the Soviet, and it was reported they were both shot at the time. Had they gotten out of the country alive, the London offices would certainly have heard from or seen them. On the other hand, neither one was a fool. Both might have played politics and stalled along in any way they had to in order to come through and eventually turn in vitally important information. My impression is, however, that there would have been opportunity to hear from them before this if they are alive. As to the other papers in Odessa, Rostov, Nijni-Novgorod, Petrograd,— all over the place,— your sources of information are probably much more reliable than mine. One doesn't ask too many questions here, if he contem¬ plates pulling through to better times! Are you making a systematic tour of the country for the Syndicate?"

"Hardly anything as dangerous and uncomfortable as that, just now. When some kind of responsible government is established, that will have to be done, of course — but for the present we wish to ascertain from Rykoff, if possible, just what the status of our newspapers is, today, and what his intentions are concerning them. Incidentally, of course, we shall keep our eyes open and learn what we can of the general trend. Now—what do you advise in regard to procuring an interview at the Kremlin?"

"Hmph! I would have suggested your coming here much more openly in the first place! Had you entered the country as duly accredited representatives of the Internationale Pressbund—"

"Which we really did—"

"I know— I know! But you didn't go to a hotel as such representatives naturally would, in the first place— and you didn't apply at once for your interview with Rykoff. Of course Kravotkin is now a Commissar, and as such, presumably above suspicion. But men accustomed to decent living as you both are, wouldn't put up with the deadly chill of this house, the total lack of civilized conveniences, when they could at least have kept warm in the one hotel which has been roughly gotten into shape again. It's a question as to whether your coming here wont arouse suspicion against our good friend himself—"

"Even if we knew him in the days of the old Empire?"

"Well— that helps, of course; but it still leaves a lot of explaining to do. My suggestion would be that we go at once to the German commissioner, here. He will be entirely satisfied with your passports and my vouching for you. Any explanation which he offers concerning your movements since you crossed the border is likely to be accepted, I think."

"You don't suppose it might be better for Kravotkin to apply for the interview— and introduce us?"

"No! Let him ask that an interview be granted you as old friends of his—that would be the natural thing for him to do in his position, and it will be a good indorsement for you both. But your request should properly come through the German commissioner, who, in a general way, looks after his nationals in Russia and keeps track of them. What makes it a bit awkward is that he should have had advance notice of your coming and applied for the interview before you arrived. However— there are good explanations why he didn't. Suppose we go and see him at once— while our friend, here, goes to the Kremlin with his own request—eh?"

NEXT morning Liebknecht and Bergmann received word from the German commissioner that an interview with Rykoff had been arranged and that they should present themselves at the Kremlin about eleven. Appearing at the Porte Spasskiia with the pass which had been sent them, they were taken by one of the Red Guard to a small room on the ground floor of the Petit Palais just inside the gate— where Alexander II was born— and kept waiting there, without anything to eat or any chance to get it, until past five in the afternoon. It was understood in a general way that Rykoff had not settled as yet upon the rooms which he was going to occupy officially, and had been transacting business in various different imperial chambers until final arrangements were made. Eventually the two supposed Germans were taken into what was the Salon de l'Imperatrice on the ground floor of the Grand Palais, down near the river-wall of the Kremlin inclosure.

As the sun was just setting behind heavy snow-clouds, the big vaulted chamber was gloomy in the extreme. At the rounded east end where the Empress' throne had formerly stood on a raised dais, there was a broad table and several chairs, the only light in the room being from a lamp on the table. At one side, against the wall, there was an American typewriter on a small stand— a girl with black hair and dark red gown taking such memoranda or dictation as might be required. It took but a moment for Dr. Liebknecht to decide that the man who sat behind the broad table was neither Rykoff, Litvinoff nor Kalenin,— two of whom he knew by sight, — but a minor Soviet official who evidently acted both as interpreter and spokesman for the new dictator. Inferentially, the man who sat in a big leather chair at the left of this man and a couple of feet back from the table, smoking a very good cigar, was Rykoff himself. His features were markedly Finnish, indicating also his peasant birth, but his university education and ability to keep his mouth shut gave him a reserved ease of manner which was deceptive. He was neither as easy nor as considerate, according to Western notions, as he seemed— and was in poor health. Besides the dictator, his mouthpiece Michaelovitch, the girl and the two Germans, there were but two others in the room: officers of the Red Guard, at the other end.

After the callers had seated themselves in front of the big table, Michaelovitch glanced at some memoranda concerning them, and presently asked:

"I presume, Herr Doktor, that you and Herr Bergmann are here to check up in a general way the present status of newspapers formerly owned or controlled by your press-syndicate. Is that correct?"

Both the man and his superior had eaten a plentiful lunch at four, with a quart of champagne each, and were feeling comfortably relaxed, in no particular hurry for the other things before them, that evening. Their visitors had eaten nothing since nine in the morning— and though tired, for this reason, were that much keener mentally.

"Newspapers of the Imperial Pressbund, I believe?" added Michaelovitch.

"Before the war, sir, they belonged to the Deutsche Reichspressbund. We have since merged with the International— a much larger and more powerful organization. Of course in anything so chaotic as the upheaval caused by the war, the question of property ownership was blotted out for several years at least. But in any final adjustment of claims as a basis for business relations with Russia in future, it must naturally come up again. That is unavoidable. We spent several millions of good hard cash to acquire, equip and develop some twenty newspapers throughout this country— and while our original organization had its headquarters in Berlin, it was even then as much English, French and American as it was German. Today the German branch is the smallest end of the International. Concerning some of our papers here, we have more or less definite information— Spielmeyer's Moskauer Zeitung, for example. He placed himself at the Soviet's disposal, and I believe has faithfully carried out its orders— because he had no alternative under existing conditions. He is still in your hands— pending any future arrangement between us. As for many of the other papers, we assume that the plants have been destroyed and the operating forces shot. Fortunes of war, of. course!

"Now— until some final adjustment can be made concerning what we had before the war, I have a tentative suggestion to offer concerning those papers which are still in operating condition. Of course we don't expect you to let us publish our newspapers as we do in countries under more settled conditions— that is, publish all the news, as our organization gets and telegraphs it. But it seems to me that we might agree upon some such working arrangement as this: You confirm and guarantee our title to the various properties— permit us to publish in them such outside news as your censors will pass, and have our editors, here, telegraph our offices in other capitals such Russian news as your censors are willing to have go out. Then allow us enough of each paper's revenue to cover its running expenses— the Soviet to receive any profits there may be until such time as some final adjustment of our claims is made. Considering that you have had the use of our property at no expense for the last six years, it seems to me that this is a more than fair offer upon our part— very much to your advantage, inasmuch as it gives you the outside papers of our syndicate, all over the world, in which to make any official statements you wish concerning your government and conditions in Russia."

"You would be willing to publish what we give you as your own news or editorials — coming from the editors of your papers?"

"Not for one holy minute! I didn't say that! What you suggest would be simply lending ourselves to the dissemination of your propaganda under the cloak of our own editorial opinion. Of course we assume that your propaganda in future is likely to be a less dangerous proposition to the outside world than it was under Lenine — but lending the resources of a great news-syndicate to any propaganda whatever is too impossible a proposition to consider for a moment! No! Give us statements or articles signed by one or more of your government officials, and we'll be glad to print them broadcast— because you will then assume the responsibility for them. Give us unsigned data which we say we obtained from your government, officially."

"And— er— if we decline to consider your proposition altogether, Herr Doktor— on the ground that your newspapers were spoils of war, taken by us during the war — and that, whatever future adjustment of your claims might be made in some improbable contingency, the whole matter doesn't in the least interest us just now? Eh?"

"Well— let's go into that a bit. After persistent effort during the last two or three years, you have just secured tentative recognition of your Soviet government by Great Britain, Italy and Norway— with the probability that other European states will soon risk it on the same basis. This recognition, however, is founded upon the implication that resumption of trade-relations with Russia will be governed by the same rules of fair-dealing which form the basis of all business in other countries. If, for example, one single Englishman is murdered by anyone connected with the Soviet government,—or the property and business of another confiscated without just cause, — trade-relations between Russia and the British Empire will cease.

"With any other nation, the case will be the same. The price you pay for recognition by other governments is the guarantee of safety and fair-dealing with their nationals. Russia cannot exist in complete isolation without the trade of outside nations— she cannot even develop her own vast resources without outside capital and engineering. So, when you put the question as you did just now, it means that you are quite willing to jeopardize all you have been working so hard to obtain— throw it away, rather than make what other nations consider fair business concessions. Of course, none of Russia's outside creditors is foolish enough to think of occupying your country with an army— starting another senseless and bloody war, for the sake of collecting some part of his just claims by force! It is your privilege to do as you please in matters like this. But as Russia gradually works out of her ruin and horror to more stable conditions and brighter days, she must have outside help. This help is available if Russia will give it any kind of a gambling chance. It's up to you gentlemen of the Soviet!"

A SLIGHT movement of anger and impatience from the half-sick man in the chair behind him prompted the tone of warning that was evident in Michaelovitch's next remark.

"You are not here to instruct us in the policy of our government, Herr Doktor! In fact, your general tone is grossly impertinent! And really, we have no means of knowing with any certainty that you two are even the men you claim to be—"

"Then we must settle that point before we say anything further, Herr Michaelovitch— because our personal safety depends upon it! I will write out a message which your radio-operator may send at once to your representatives in Berlin, Paris and London— to be presented to the managers of our local offices in those cities and subsequently verified by one of the government officials. In this message, there will be one word which has a separate code meaning to those managers—is known only to them and us two. Their replies will guarantee to your representatives that none but Herr Bergmann or myself could have written the message in just that way. Of course you've seen our Berlin passports, which scarcely could have been obtained by impostors. The German commissioner, here, has vouched for us. Herr Spielmeyer, of the Moskauer Zeitung, has known us both for years. Any interruption in our daily messages to Berlin and London, while we are in Russia, will bring an official inquiry as to our safety and whereabouts—"

"Notwithstanding all that,— assuming that your identity is really established, which we do not actually question,— we might consider it advisable to eliminate you as being of those in control of a great publicity machine which by no means sympathizes with our aims and has been often quite openly inimical."

"Oh— suit yourselves as to that! Herr Bergmann and I have both lived our lives — fairly active ones, I assure you. In any circumstances, we've but a few years more — so it's no great matter one way or the other. Look you, Herr Michaelovitch! We came here under the impression that a change for the better had already started. Lenine dead, Trotsky living through his final illness from cancer in the Caucasus, your two houses of Parliament and Council of Commissars beginning to function with more or less system, some effort being made to reorganize your currency and finances, an encouraging start at reconstruction-work under German supervision in progress, the prospect of your being able to open up world-trade again. Our impulse was to help you in bringing order out of chaos. Herr Bergmann, here— no longer with our syndicate— is looking for development-work— mines, railways, electric-generation— in which to invest millions. If you have no interest in what we offer, if it's really the same old regime in other clothes,—which we don't wish to believe,— why, we're sorry— that's all! Ready to leave Russia and wait another ten or twenty years for real improvement here."

DURING the latter part of the discussion a tall, striking-looking woman had quietly slipped into the room through some concealed door— and stood leaning against the wall, in shadow, back of Rykoff's chair. Her face seemed vaguely familiar to "Liebknecht," but it was "Bergmann" who recognized her and whispered two words so that none but his companion heard them: "Anna Tcherinoff."

In all the hell-brew of the revolution and its aftermath, any attempt at tracing out the proportion of basic truth in the stories told about this woman would obviously be futile— though there was no question that many searing experiences had gone into the making up of Anna Tcherinoff and left their mark upon her. Among the many stories and rumors, it was said that she had been a governess in one of the princely families before the war, educated as an aristocrat, mistress of a grand duke, with more rubles to throw away than she could spend; then— a starving refugee in a freezing cellar during the revolution, mistress of a butcher who rose slightly above the surface-scum as a commissar, murderess of three early Soviet officials in succession,— she called them "necessary executions," and got away with it,—then the most deadly marksman of all the fiends in woman's form who performed wholesale executions in the cellars and pits. It was said to be one of her little amusements, at twenty paces, to place the eight shots from her automatic through the lobe of each ear, as the victim stood against the cellar-wall — through the flesh over the ribs at each side, through the joint of each great toe, through the navel and then through the heart. The men to whom she was supposed to have granted her favors all died, of one thing or another— though there appeared to be no suggestion of her instrumentality. Presently Anna dropped a bit of penciled memoranda so that it fluttered into the dictator's lap. After glancing at it with a slight lifting of the eyebrows, he passed it to Michaelovitch— who understood his unspoken instructions and said, with deceptive friendliness:

"How long have you known the Commissar Kravotkin, Herr Doktor? How does it happen that you are staying in his quarters instead of a hotel— where we usually lodge our distinguished guests?"

"We both knew Kravotkin before the war— as professor in the University. He is an old and valued friend whom we considered likely to have more information concerning our various newspapers than even Spielmeyer, because he has been sent upon government business pretty much over the country. We talked until three o'clock this morning— then accepted what sleeping accommodation he had. Tonight we thought of staying at the hotel if we can find room in it."

"Suppose we invite you to remain here in the Kremlin, instead? We can offer you more comfortable beds and a warmer room."

"If you really mean that, sir, it sounds most attractive. Frankly, a hot meal would be even more so—we've eaten nothing since morning."

MICHAELOVITCH glanced at them searchingly. Could it be possible that these two sophisticated men had misunderstood his sinister meaning? Beckoning the guard-officers from the other end of the big, gloomy room, he instructed them to escort the supposed Germans around to the Caserne by the Porte Troitskaia, place them in a vacant officer's-room at the end of the upper dormitories and see that they had something to eat.

But as the two got out of their chairs to accompany the officers, Anna Tcherinoff suggested that it would be better for various reasons to lodge them in one of the sleeping-chambers directly overhead, in the Grand Palais itself, as it would be easier to send for them if further points for discussion came up— adding, as an afterthought, that she herself would see to the preparation of a meal for them. And this last remark sent a creepy feeling down the length of their spines as they overheard it.

Michaelovitch and his superior, however, had serious doubts of the consequences if they actually permitted what they supposed she had in mind— these two might be of sufficient importance in Germany for any outrage committed upon them to stop the work of every German in Russia. And there were some eighty thousand Germans in one capacity or another, with the type of thoroughly efficient brains which the Soviet had practically annihilated among its own nationals. The suggestion as to confining them in one of the Palace rooms overhead, instead of in the barracks, was adopted— but a curt word or two cautioned the woman that while there was no objection to her talking with them, getting what amusement she could, it would be unhealthy for her if she went too far. (Probably for a moment, she coolly speculated to herself as to what would probably happen if she killed Rykoff and Michaelovitch where they sat— with just two shots! Neither had ever been quite so near sudden death as he was at that moment. But she appeared to acquiesce.)

The officers conducted their prisoners to one of the upper rooms in a pleasant, friendly way as if they were really guests of the government, and one of them said he would himself oversee the preparation of their dinner.

"I'll eat it with you, gentlemen— so you needn't hesitate about enjoying it. Confidentially, I think you need not feel over-apprehensive about being detained here. We belong to the same organization as your friend Kravotkin— have been instructed to look after your safety while in the Kremlin. There are at least forty of us within the walls, in one capacity or another. The time isn't quite ripe for an upheaval, though matters, may come to a show-down any time. Conditions can't go on as they are in Russia— there must be a change for the better, soon, because the masses are beginning to want stabilized conditions— a cessation of bloodshed, trade with the outside nations, more than any visionary idea of an impossible Utopia."

WHEN the officers left them, the supposed Germans made no attempt to leave the room or explore the upper floor of the Palace. There were no guards in sight, but there was the possibility that spies of the Cheka had them under observation. Presently, as they were smoking and chatting, they had the feeling that some one had entered the room behind them— where, apparently, there had been no door. Without the slightest evidence of being on their guard, Bergmann said something which suggested going over to one of the windows and looking down into the court. They did this casually— one hand holding a cigar and the other in a pocket for warmth. When they turned and seated themselves again, it was in such positions that each commanded a view over one half of the room with its obscure corners dimly revealed by the single lamp and the smoldering logs in the fireplace. It took the Earl but a second to make out the shadowy figure of Anna Tcherinoff in one corner, where she had just stepped through a panel in the wainscoting— having known certain things about this particular room when she suggested their being confined in it. As the supposed Liebknecht watched her, she slowly raised one arm— something gleaming dully in her hand.

If the stories told of her had much foundation in fact, the woman was quite reckless enough to kill them both in defiance of Michaelovitch's orders— just for the mere curiosity of seeing in what way he'd attempt to punish her for the act, and the satisfaction of killing several of the Soviet officials before they could carry it out—  perhaps bluffing it through to a position of greater respect and authority for herself in the end. But something in Liebknecht's personality interested her. He had expressed his views to Michaelovitch so unequivocally, with such a complete disregard of what they might order done with him, that she wanted to know whether he had spoken through sheer ignorance of the danger he ran in using plain language under such conditions, or whether these two courteous gentlemen really had unshakable nerve. So what she had in mind was a little fancy pistol-practice— not actually hitting them if they kept perfectly still— to demonstrate whether she could break this nerve or not. There would be at least an hour, she thought, before the officers returned with the dinner.

But in all Anna's practice with the weapon, she had taught herself by the European method of using a steady and deliberate aim. The snap-shooting of Western America she not only knew nothing about but wouldn't have believed possible until she saw it done.

A corner of the table prevented her from seeing the hand which had been in Trevor's overcoat pocket as he sat down again; she'd no idea that either of them had seen her as yet. Before her own arm came up to a level with her eyes, a streak of flame spurted from the hand which lay in the Earl's lap. The automatic was torn out of her grasp with a violent blow which paralyzed the limb to her elbow for a moment— during which Trevor got out of his chair in a leisurely manner, walking over to pick up her pistol, from which he emptied the clip of its remaining shells before handing it back to her.

"Ah, Madame! I'm sorry! I fear I've made your hand numb for a bit,— a thirtyeight bullet hits with terrific force,—but it was difficult to disarm you more gently. You'd have pulled your own trigger in less than a quarter of a second— the light was none too good, either!"

AFTER disposing of her weapon, mysteriously, in the folds of her skirt, she was rubbing and stretching the fingers of her right hand while looking him over appraisingly. This man was something new in her experience. Having oiled that sliding panel herself, she knew that she had entered the room without a particle of noise; yet both these Germans must have sensed her presence instantly— could undoubtedly have killed her before she drew a weapon. Then had come the Herr Doktor's unbelievable shot— premeditated, of course, and sure. She knew it had been no chance hit— knew the man probably could have placed the whole eight shots within a silver ruble at that distance, firing from his hip!

"Herr Doktor— I salute you! That was more than good shooting! But you really weren't in as much danger as it looked from where you sat. You see, I had the notion of testing out your nerve a bit— seeing whether you spoke as you did to Michaelovitch through sheer ignorance of your position since coming within the walls of the Kremlin, or whether you were in the habit of pleasing yourself with plain talk regardless of any personal risk. It might have been either, you know. American Senators and representative businessmen have made recent tours through Russia and gone home again with the impression that conditions here have been greatly exaggerated as far as the personal safety of tourists is concerned. Naturally! It served the purpose of the Soviet leaders to have them go home with just that impression— and they were ‘personally conducted' from the moment they crossed the Russian border to the time they left the country. Presumably they didn't know it— but some one was accountable for them at every step. We anticipated much from their influence at home.

"The same thing is happening with distinguished visitors from America and other countries every day— with committees sent here to look Russia over and report upon what they see. But when any of them do seek interviews with our highest Soviet officials, they are most politic in what they say. You were not! Your whole manner was that of one who is positive that we must eventually accept alternatives and greatly modify our political convictions whether we will or no. Well— a great many have been shot in Russia during the last few years for a much less offensive attitude! What we will do with your former newspapers and plants is for us to decide without advice or suggestions from you! Now, privately, we may think that you were partly right in what you said— some of us, at least; and one admits that your manner was courteous enough— for a German. But Germans, knowing more about conditions here than other nationalities, are quite well aware that the Soviet hasn't power enough to guarantee the safety of human life in Russia if it really wished to, that it considers itself entirely justified in executing any person who threatens its rule."

"Then we are prisoners, eh? Not guests of the government?"

"Now you are pleased to joke at my expense, Herr Doktor— which has never been a safe thing to do. I have a long memory— and pay such debts, sooner or later! You couldn't make me believe for an instant that you are the stupid fools who could possibly misunderstand your position, here!"

"I'm sorry, Madame! I offer you my apology— not because I fear you in the least, but from the fact that the joke seems to be upon us, and we have the right to be amused if we choose to look at it that way."

"So! You consider me harmless—colorless, perhaps? H-m-m—others have not altogether agreed with that view. Perhaps you do not know what things have been said of me—or even my name? Eh?"

"Your reputation has traveled, Anna Tcherinoff— Bergmann recognized you at first glance. You are handsome enough to win the heart of a woman-hater, and devil enough to kill him after you've done it— if one believes what he hears. If I had the time to remain in Russia long enough, I'd make you love me— just to see what would happen to both of us! But as I haven't, we can at least salute each other—and ‘pass in the night'—each wondering what might have been? Eh— ma belle?"

The woman stood there partly in shadow, her face alone lighted up by fitful gleams from the logs in the fireplace— looking at him strangely. This man was—different. He treated her courteously, as a decent woman, knowing, as he thought, a good deal of what she'd done. With the probable conviction that she was about to kill him, he had merely disarmed her by the most wonderful shooting she had ever seen. He had laughed at her warning that she was dangerous to joke with— and said be would make her love him if he had time. Well— she thought it quite within her power to see that he had the time. If he made good his threat— she would see what came of it— somehow, a game of that sort had its attractions for her. If he failed— she would thoroughly enjoy killing him— rather slowly. She smiled a little, challengingly, into his eyes— and disappeared through the panel just as Sanovitch came along the corridor with a trooper bearing their dinner.

AS they chatted over the meal after the trooper had gone out, they gave him the details of Anna's visit— the gist of what had been said. The officer shivered a little, nervously, as he lighted a cigarette.

"I think you are unnecessarily reckless at times, mon ami! You could have spoken a good deal less plainly to Michaelovitch than you did— which got you de tained here in what might be a very serious position if it were not for our men in the Kremlin tonight. And that's nothing to the risk you incur by joking with, even threatening, the Tcherinoff. I assure you in all seriousness that she's more dangerous than a cobra— and that so many men live in deadly fear of what she may do that her influence and sources of information are pretty widespread!"

"Then why the devil hasn't somebody killed her before this!"

"Because it is supposed that she has put a mass of typewritten information in certain hands, outside of Russia, which will be made public here if anything happens to her— information which, unquestionably, will cause the assassination of a good many in the Soviet government. Like a boomerang— nobody knows who'll be hit by it, and things are chaotic enough, anyhow. Aside from that, unless taken completely off her guard, it's fairly certain that she could answer for the lives of two or three men in any attempt to capture her. That wonderful shot of yours must have been the surprise of her life! I doubt if you'd catch her a second time the same way!

"Well— I think we'd better get you out of the Kremlin before morning. H-m-m— I'm tempted to suggest something which I wouldn't dream of in connection with men who were less daredevils than you two? Eh? Look here, gentlemen! You're in Russia to get as close an idea as possible of what conditions really are— yes? You've shown that you'll risk a good bit in securing such information. And whatever report you take out of the country will find its way into the hands of those willing to back our organization, outside— perhaps with men and munitions, perhaps with money and supplies, at the proper time. It is even likely that they will be guided by your opinion as to the time to make a definite start. Now, it just happens that most of the Soviet leaders are gathering at this moment in what was formerly the Salle St. Alexandre in the south wing, one of the largest in the palace. It's to be a general discussion of government policy— and some of the Parliament are pretty sure to crowd in too. Rykoff is too sick to say much tonight— but he and Kalenin and Litvinoff are pretty much in accord. They really supply the power behind him, have the nearest a definite plan to propose, I think. Well— just above where the throne used to be, where the committee-table is now, there's a little concealed balcony with a small closet behind it in the wall. I doubt if more than two or three men in Moscow have bothered to hunt out the secret passage which leads to it. Are you game to sneak up there and get all you can of the discussion?"

"Hmph! Give us a chance, and see! It'll be an adventure worth remembering even if we get little more than we've picked up already. Overhearing a Soviet conference within the walls of the Kremlin, patrolled by the Red Guard, is an experience which few men will ever boast of, I fancy."

WHEN they had finished their dinner, Sanovitch left them for a few moments, then returned with a couple of troopers' overcoats, cloth helmets, belts and muskets. Acting upon his suggestion, they put these on over their own clothes— looking pretty bulky, but not suspiciously so, from the fact that a good many of the rank and file wore all they could get under their uniform overcoats for the sake of the additional warmth. Their own sealskin tarbushes they stuffed inside the coats; and as both had been wearing heavy Russian boots, there was nothing suspicious in their footgear beyond a better quality which would not be noticed, particularly at night. Following him as two sergeants of his troop,— with a much snappier military bearing than any but a few of his men had,—they walked along the upper corridors of the east and south wings until they came to a small lumber-room directly over the Salle St. Alexandre. When the door of this had been closed and locked, Sanovitch touched a spring which opened a large panel in the wainscoting— saying as he did so that he believed the little balcony under them must have been used by the Czar's secret guards rather than musicians. As the balcony was merely a part of the mural carving between two of the pilasters, as seen from any corner of the big hall, it was practically unnoticeable; there were openings several inches across, of course, but these appeared to be merely spaces between the carvings. They really ran no risk at all in looking down through some of the smaller openings, and such were the acoustic properties of the hall that they seemed to be in the drum of an ear, catching every word that was spoken. The end of the big hall directly below was fairly well lighted in order that faces might be seen distinctly as various men spoke, but the opposite portion was in deep shadow; the whole effect was dramatic— Rembrandtesque. In addition to the Council of Commissars, perhaps thirty or forty men from the Council of Nationalities (Senate) had insisted upon being present at the conference. They really had no business there— but the Earl and Sir Abdool noted as a significant fact that where, in Lenine's day, any usurpation of privilege like this would have been dealt with before a firing-squad, the new Soviet leaders seemed to be letting their subordinates get badly out of hand.

For a while the proceedings resembled a bear-garden— a dozen men from different parts of the crowd shouting what they supposed to be speeches, and clamoring for attention. It might have gone on for hours that way if some unseen force hadn't presently brought about a general hush without anyone understanding just what was happening. Then it was seen that Anna Tcherinoff, in a flame-colored gown, was standing at the side of Rykoff's chair— one beautiful arm resting carelessly across the back of it. When the chamber was absolutely silent, she made a few brief observations— pointing out that if they expected to get any action whatever, come to any decision, but one man could speak at a time. She would act as chairman— giving first one and then another his opportunity for addressing them.

The woman was feared by every man in the room, yet respected for some wonderful and mysterious ability which they believed her to possess. So their answer was a wild burst of applause— then silence. She recognized a violent agitator from Kiev, who sprang upon his feet and began denouncing other members of the Council for what he called a betrayal of all their radical principles. He said the eyes of the whole labor world were upon them, that the abandoning of communism and anti-capitalism advocated by Lenine was a betrayal of every laborer in other countries. He ended up with a wild tirade of denunciation against the bourgeoisie, stating that there were still a few millions too many of them in Russia who must be executed as soon as possible— cursing every form of capitalism and so-called "civilization."

There was some applause as he finally sat down, but it seemed to be clear that the majority were not with him at all. He was amazed at his lack of support— almost frothing at the mouth with rage and hatred. For the opposition to his views, the Tcherinoff then nodded to a spectacled man of quiet, assured bearing who spoke in a tone clear enough to be distinctly understood, but without raising his voice. He used simple terms— homely, everyday comparisons— quoted facts which nobody present could dispute and made the conclusion to be drawn from them so apparent that even the most thick-headed fool in the gathering could grasp it.

None of them could refute his arguments— but the majority could kill a capitalist wherever they found one, and that seemed to be the dominant idea in their minds. On the other hand, there was an undercurrent entirely in accord with him, made up of those present who had any capacity for independent thinking. And with all these different opinions and forces in conflict, the big chamber, shortly after midnight, was chaos, as far as any definite plan of government was concerned. Trevor and Sir Abdool picked out from the faces below them at least half a dozen whom they knew to have been friends of Kerensky in the old days, members of the circle, blood spurting between the fingers which he pressed against his side— then pitched headlong to the marquetry floor, while the furious bolshevik from Kiev wiped a long knife on his coat-sleeve and then shoved it back inside his coat.

"Who did that!" The words cut through the momentary silence like a whip. "Stand aside—the rest of you!"

And then— a shot from Anna Tcherinoff's automatic went squarely through the forehead of the Ukrainian, who survived his victim less than two minutes.

IN the silence which followed, while the two dead men were being carried out, Sanovitch whispered to the supposed Germans that they had better be getting out of the Kremlin before anything further happened which might make it impossible —saying that he would have to get an order from his colonel for some detail in the city before he could take even a file of his own men outside the walls. His superior officer, quite evidently, was also a member of the revolutionary organization; while more recent, growing organization for revolution— and there had been enough opposition during the conference to show that even if suspicion of this were directed against them, it wouldn't mean, necessarily, risk of execution or assassination, as would have been the case a year before. The times were slowly changing in Russia. But even as this thought was in their minds, a scream rang through the chamber. One of the groups separated a little as a member who had been arguing on the more progressive basis staggered around in a small Sanovitch was making his request, Colonel Akov gave no indication that he knew they were not his own troopers or suspected why the outside detail was wanted. He merely filled out a blank ordering the captain to proceed to a certain address with a file of men and search the house for a conspirator wanted by the government. The three clicked their heels together, saluted and went downstairs—picking up eight more at the barracks. With Sanovitch at their head, the troopers mounted at the stables back of the officers' quarters and rode out through the Place du Tsar, with only the fitful light from a foggy moon to guide them.

A little farther, and they rode through the gloomy Porte Spasskiia, and on through the silent, ruined city to the house occupied by Kravotkin, where Sanovitch thought they would be as safe as anywhere, inasmuch as there was an under ground passage in the rear to a house on another street through which they might escape if too closely pressed. Accompanying them inside, they found Kravotkin and Spielmeyer sitting by the stove in the room on the second floor— noticeably relieved at the sight of them.

"Gott! You are lucky, my friends! You always haf been, to be sure—but one should not push one's luck too far! They made no attempt to detain you, then?"

Sanovitch laughed. "The joke of it is, they did detain them— in fact, were of two minds whether to shoot them at once and have done with it! Our good friends are not discreet, you understand. They gave our new dictator about the plainest line of talk he has yet heard from an outsider— in a very courteous way, of course, but not sugared. Then, when I'd arrested and confined them in an upper room of the Palace, along comes the Tcherinoff through a secret panel in the wainscoting to amuse herself with a little pistol practice— and the good Herr Doktor shoots the pistol out of her hand before she could pull the trigger, once. Anna was surprised— I'll swear to that! They joked at her in a courteous way. And upon my soul, I believe the woman was half in love with Liebknecht when she left them!

"She's a strange mixture, that one! She's been loved by several infatuated men— who died of it afterward. She's vindictively hated by thousands— who yet lack the nerve to kill her! Apparenly she has the mind of a fiend— and no morals! Yet an hour ago she prevented what undoubtedly would have been a massacre of at least half the Council by calmly killing a little Ukrainian assassin in the midst of them, after he had just knifed one of our progressives. Tonight she exhibited the only absolutely cold, thinking brain in all that Soviet mob who claim to be governing us. She dominated them— and— here is food for reflection— as far as I've heard, every prominent man she's ever killed has been an implacable communist or bolshevist who would have assassinated every believer in constitutional government as a matter of principle!"

FOUR days later, as their train stopped at a little station near the Roumanian border and they were congratulating themselves upon getting out of Russia,— aided at every step by Kravotkin's organization,— they and their luggage were taken from the compartment by a file of the Red Guard and brought to a stone cottage at the edge of the town. In the living-room a woman muffled in sables sat behind a table littered with official-looking documents, one of which she was filling out. As the soldiers retired, closing the door after them, she opened her fur collar slightly— revealing the handsome, brooding face of Anna Tcherinoff.

"So— gentlemen! After defying me, you thought there would be no great difficulty in escaping from Russia! And you, Herr Doktor, had the insolence to say you'd make me love you if you had the time! Well— suppose I give you the time, plenty of it, with the understanding that you die, rather painfully, if you fail? Eh?"

The supposed Liebknecht smiled, engagingly, in her face.

"I notice a couple of ‘execution-blanks' among those papers, Madame. Were you considering that an hour— possibly two— should be plenty of time for me to make good? And how does this affect the status of my good friend Bergmann? He made no threats and didn't presume to joke with you! Oh, well— have your way! He thinks you can't kill him, because he is a fatalist and knows that his time has not yet come. As for me— well, I'm waiting to see. You're a handsome creature— and I believe you really want for Russia exactly what all of us outsiders do. Eh?"

She folded two documents and handed them to him with a smile.

"Herr Doktor— I think you win! These papers are safe-conducts which will get you out of Russia with no further trouble. I can't permit two men of your magnificent nerve and inborn courtesy to be shot like so many rats— and I know you came here to help rather than destroy Russia. Some day, I hope you'll both return— I shall not forget you! Try to think of Anna Tcherinoff as possibly something better than what her enemies say of her. Even my reported amours are lies, scarcely worth the trouble of denying— at least, all but one of them. Au revoir!"

As they leaned from the window of their compartment, looking back, a tall figure in priceless sables was sharply etched against the dazzling snow— watching the train out of sight

___________________________

10: Bait, Hook and Sinker

William Almon Wolff

1885-1933

Blue Book May 1924

THERE was something irregular about Jimmy Scott’s behavior. Anyone might have seen that, had he not been fairly safe from observation because his private office was the last word in privacy. He was, and he wasn’t, the Scott of the Trainor-Scott Company; the explanation of that seeming paradox was that the original Scott had been his father, and that he was secretary and a large stockholder by virtue of his father’s will. So he had a room, a room just as good as Trainor’s, with nice, shiny mahogany furniture, and big, comfortable chairs, and a glass top on his desk, and a fine rug on the floor, and all that sort of thing. In fact, the only thing he lacked in that superbly equipped modem office was something to do. And— the devil, according to a fairly well substantiated rumor, has a way of finding mischief for idle hands to do.

Over the door in that beautiful office of Scott’s there was, of course, a transom, which was partly open. The door, naturally enough, opened into the big main office, where stenographers and bookkeepers and such small fry sat and worked. That was what worried Jimmy— they worked. He would cheerfully have traded places with the junior office-boy! The boy would have been absolutely and entirely capable of running Jimmy’s job— assuming that he knew enough to sign his name on the dotted line, right by the little penciled cross. And Jimmy was beginning to have doubts about whether he was qualified to fill even an office-boy’s shoes. However, to revert to Jimmy’s irregular behavior—

Jimmy wanted to know certain things that were going on in that outer office, and he wanted to become cognizant of them without crudely opening his door and looking out. He had been reading a good deal about submarines and periscopes, and his reading gave him an idea, which took him to the article on periscopes in his encyclopedia. As a result of that he procured these things: one reading-glass lens, one small mirror, one long cardboard tube, of the sort in which maps are mailed, one piece of ground glass.

These things he attached to one another by means of glue and pieces of string, in such a way that he could aim the lens at the outer office, through the transom. What went on outside was then thrown upon the mirror, through the lens. The mirror was fixed at an angle of forty-five degrees, and from it, down the tube, the image reflected in the mirror was cast upon the ground glass, so that Jimmy could perceive every movement of— well, of Miss Janet Cameron, in particular. It was her movements that interested him; he didn’t care what the rest of the office force did.

MAYBE that periscope wouldn’t have won the approval of an expert in such matters. But it pleased Jimmy. When it came to mechanical matters, he was a good deal of a dub. And the fact that his device worked was about all that counted with him.

It showed him Miss Cameron. Specifically, it showed him a girl attired in the most rigid, the plainest sort of clothes, who still looked— oh, like a girl! She had soft, fluffy brown hair, that rather obviously triumphed over efforts to make it look prim and slick. And she could wear a plain, tailored waist, almost mannish as to its collar, and an even plainer serge skirt, and could, thus, deceive the casual eye about her figure. But nothing short of a surgical operation, could have been done about her features and her complexion and a mutinous dimple that turned up, every now and then, just when she particularly didn’t want it to show itself. Jimmy, it was plain, derived a certain pleasure from watching her. And it was, unmistakably, she that he watched.

He waited, with the patience of an angler regarding his float, for the proper moment. And then, when for the first time since he had begun his vigil, Janet was sitting in front of her machine, rather dreamily, with nothing to do, and all the other stenographers were scattered around in various offices, presumably taking dictation, he pressed one of the little row of push-buttons on his desk, dismantled his periscope with reckless haste and hid it under a leather couch, and then sat down, with a stem and resolute look, at his desk.

There was a dubious knock at his door, and he said, “Come in!” as gruffly as he could.

Janet entered, tentatively, looking surprised.

“Good morning, Miss Cameron!” said Jimmy crisply.

“You rang for a stenographer, didn’t you?” she said, hesitating in the door.

“Yes— got a letter I wish you’d take for me,” he said. “Rather a long one.”

She looked surprised, and a little suspicious. But she came forward resignedly and drew up a chair, and put her notebook on the extension flap of his desk, and produced a sharpened pencil. It was as if she had no real faith, somehow, in the letter he was talking about, but was prepared to go through the motions, anyway.

“Letter Mr. William— William— Smith,” he said. “University Club— Chicago— yes, Chicago. ‘Dear Bill.’ ”

“Oh— a personal letter!” she said, as if that explained a good deal.

“Yes—but it’s perfectly all right to dictate it,” he said. “Seems to be the thing, these days. Got a letter from a chap the other day telling me he was engaged— fixing it up for me to be best man— didn’t even sign it! ‘Dictated but not read,’ you know. I’d call that a bit thick, but—well, there you are!”

She made no comment.

“ ‘Dear Bill,’ ” he repeated, tentatively. He paused and thought. Unconsciously his hand reached for a pencil, and he began to scribble on a pad. He wasn’t used to dictating, and he showed it. But presently he got started— torrentially.

“ ‘Dear Bill: If I didn’t know you, I’d think you meant to be sarcastic when you ask if I’m too busy to write letters! I am busy, at that— trying to find something to do. And I don’t mean that I’m looking for a job, either. I’ve got a job—or it’s got me. The one you know about— being secretary of the Trainor-Scott Company. I’m a dummy director. I’m a fifth wheel. For usefulness and earning my munificent salary, I’m a joke. If they appraised all the people connected with the concern, I’d come just after the office-boy from across the hall who comes in to visit with ours.’ ”

Miss Cameron took that down, unmoved, so far as he could see, and waited, her face bereft of all expression, for more. It came, after a pause for reflection.

“ ‘You, knowing my true calibre, will be surprised. The trouble is that Mr. Trainor doesn’t share your knowledge, and has a set of preconceived notions. I went to college, and so he has put me down for a thing that yells rah-rah-rah at intervals and goes around in a checked cap leading a bulldog. I’m the son of a man who was unusually successful in business and made a fortune; so he knows I’m a brainless fool and would blow said fortune in, if I weren’t restrained— incidentally wrecking the business. The result is that I’m secretary of the company because my father was, and he left me his stock, but all I do is to sign papers when, where and how I’m told to do it. All I know about the business is what I can discover by snooping around, and if I told the office-boy to go around the corner and buy me an evening paper, he’d have to get an O.K. from somebody before he’d be allowed to do it! And—’ ”

He broke off, and stared at Janet. Her cheeks were very red, although she was taking down his words as fast as he uttered them.

“ ‘And,’ ” he went on, getting warmed up now, “ ‘I’m just sore enough to stick around and make the old geezer admit there may be something in me. There’s another reason, too. I’m interested in one of the stenographers— chiefly, I think, because she has, and shows, such an absolutely abysmal contempt for me. She’s taken Trainor’s idea of me, you see, and—’ ”

Janet was on her feet, still flushed, with sparkling eyes and parted lips that showed her white teeth.

“Mr. Scott!” she said furiously. “You have no right to insult me—”

He was up, too, and he was just a little bit angry himself. “Insult you!” he said. “Really, Miss Cameron! Sit down, please. After all, you ought to be fair!”

She sat down, reluctantly. “I might mean one of the other stenographers—” he began. But he stopped, and grinned, rather sheepishly, when he saw how she took that— the look of contempt that was succeeding the anger in her eyes.

“I did mean you, of course,” he said calmly. “And I dictated that letter because you so studiously avoided me. I wanted to explain some things to you, and you made it impossible for me to talk to you. So I chose the only way that was left, so far as I could see—”

She got up again. And she was still indignant, although, somehow, she didn’t seem quite as indignant as she had been.

“Oh, please—be a sport, Miss Cameron!” he said. “Let me get this out of my system! You’d let anyone else you know talk to you, wouldn’t you? You’d listen to them? Well—”

“This is office time—” she said rather weakly.

He flashed up.

“Well—that’s the only time I’ve got!” he said. “I’ve got as much right to dictate a letter to you as Trainor has, or Truesdale, or Fitch— haven’t I? By George— I’ll assert some of my authority around this office, first thing any one knows!”

She sat down once more. And though it was plain that she didn’t want to do it, she couldn’t help letting a smile crinkle up the comers of her mouth a bit, and that mutinous dimple was moved to make its appearance, too.

There was a grotesque combination of earnestness and mockery about Scott, and he looked, somehow, in spite of his six feet of height and his sandy hair, like a boy engaged in conscious mischief.

“Well— that’s better! ” he said still truculently, but with rather a sigh of relief, too. “You see, Miss Cameron— I’m rather up against it here. If you’ll refer to my letter to Mr. Smith, you’ll get an inkling of what I mean. How would you like it if everyone took it for granted that you were a brainless boob? How would you like to have things fixed so that there wasn’t a thing for you to do except to come down in the morning, go out to lunch, come back, and then go home at five o’clock?”

“I wouldn’t do it!” she flashed back, and then bit her lip, as if she hadn’t meant to answer him at all.

“Well— I’ve thought of getting out, too,” he said. “I suppose that’s what you mean? I could do that, of course. I’m drawing five thousand a year here as secretary, but I could do without that— my dividends are more than I spend, as it is. But— I’m hanged if I’ll quit that way! I’m hanged if I’ll be smoked out! It isn’t as if I’d had a chance, and fallen down or made a fool of myself. I haven’t had a chance to make mistakes, even. I’m a joke. I’ll quit fast enough— after I’ve shown this gang something. But I wont do it before!”

SHE sat still, not looking at him. Her expression was rather thoughtful, now, and Jimmy considered it with a good deal of quiet satisfaction. Also, he proceeded to take further advantage of the opening he had made.

“Why— I’m the office joke!” he proclaimed earnestly. “Take you, for instance. If you hadn’t been all alone out there when I rang for a stenographer just now, you wouldn’t have come— even if it had been your turn. And— I don’t want you to think I’m snoopy, or anything, but I’ve got so much time and so little to do that I can’t help seeing a lot that goes on in the office. I noticed the way you handled Rawlinson the other day.”

She shivered a little, and looked up curiously.

“I know that sort of beast,” he went on warmly. “And you made him look like thirty cents— and did it so that he didn’t know what was happening to him. Well— you’ve been treating me the same way! And I did know what was happening.”

Now she did get up, and this time she moved resolutely toward the door, her head high, her cheeks painfully flushed. And he made no effort to detain her.

“I think you are rather unfair, Mr. Scott,” she said in a low voice. “I’m quite sure you don’t mean to be, but it’s so. If I’ve seemed inconsiderate, I’m sorry. I can see that you might have had some reason for thinking so. This— this letter isn’t to go, is it?”

“I think not,” he said gravely. “Thank you, Miss Cameron.”

IT MIGHT appear that he hadn’t accomplished much. But when he was left alone, Jimmy fairly beamed. He seemed to be remarkably well pleased with himself. And there was some reason for that. Things had been neither easy nor pleasant for him in the office. Had his father lived, he would have made a normal start in the business, probably, and worked his way up gradually. His father’s premature death, coming when Jimmy was just finishing the course in law-school which, it had been decided, would be a useful thing for him to have, though he had no intention of practicing law, had upset everything.

Jimmy wasn’t disposed to be unjust to Trainor. Distinctly a self-made man, and one strongly opinionated, too, Trainor hated even a suggestion of nepotism. An old bachelor himself, he didn’t believe a man should bring his son into a business. And so, unfairly, he had decided to insulate Jimmy, and had succeeded admirably. The office had perforce accepted Trainor’s estimate of Jimmy; the way he sat down under that treatment and drew his salary without earning it confirmed the opinion that he couldn’t amount to much. Jimmy, you see, couldn’t very well go around buttonholing people and explaining that he was just waiting for a chance to show what he could do before he got out.

Except for Janet Cameron, Jimmy mightn’t have cared so much. But she had managed to make the whole business intolerable rather than simply annoying. He had been attracted by her appearance when he first went into the office, and by her cool, quiet way of going about her work. She was far and away the ablest stenographer in the place; she knew every detail of the business. It had happened, just happened, that in Jimmy’s early days in the office, she had answered his ring several times. He hadn’t wanted to do any dictating, as a rule; he had been acquainting himself with the business, and had wanted files, and reports, and digests— things like that.

Jimmy was a pretty impetuous person. It hadn’t occurred to him that there was an essential difference between a girl whom he had met as he had met Janet Cameron, in the way of business, and one to whom he had been introduced at a dance, say, or a tea. He liked Janet, and wanted to know her better. So he followed a perfectly natural impulse to stop at her desk for a salutation when he came in in the morning; he saw no reason in the world why he shouldn’t fall into step beside her if they happened to leave the office at the same time in the evening— and saw to it that that happened with a fair degree of regularity.

He had been amazed and indignant, and finally a little amused, when he had realized that she was, very quietly, very skillfully, interposing a barrier to all that sort of thing. She had the position of her desk changed, so that he would have to make a wide detour between the entrance and his own door to stop to speak to her. She pointedly didn’t answer his ring for a stenographer. She contrived matters so that he couldn’t walk along with her when she left the office.

Since Jimmy was a perfectly normal specimen of the male sex, that sort of thing simply made him more determined. He didn’t bother her, of course; he knew, for one thing, that she could leave the office and get another job any time she liked, and anyhow, that wasn’t the idea. But he did get mad, and he amplified his program for showing the office what was in him so that it included an understanding with Janet. He was pretty sure that she had accepted Trainor’s estimate of him; he had seen, once or twice, a sort of amused, tolerant contempt in her glance at him.

So he had invented that periscope, and won, by trickery and chance, that fifteenminute talk with her. He didn’t know, but he was disposed to hope that he had given her food for a little thought about him, and thought, perhaps, a little kindlier than she had been wont to harbor.

And the next morning, when he walked into the office, she looked up, and turned half around, and gave him a cool, friendly little nod, which made him quite unreasonably happy. She had the same sort of greeting, he knew, for office-boys and bookkeepers, but it represented a distinct advance, for him— and it was about the first success of any sort that he had achieved since he had come into the office.

PROBABLY that was what nerved him to beard Trainor in his office. He went in rather casually, and asked the president to have lunch with him, and Trainor frowned.

“Lunch? Impossible, Jimmy! Get a lot done at lunch— do more business at lunch than in the office, often. Got to see Sperry today about hat hotel proposition. We’re trying to work off that block front we’ve been carrying for two years.”

“Good!” said Jimmy. “Well— of course, if you’re busy— Say, Mr. Trainor—I know you think I’m no good! But why not give me a chance? I’m not asking for any responsibility. I just want something to do—”

“H’m!” Trainor sat up, glared, started to speak, stayed still, for a moment, with his mouth open, and then shut it with a click of his teeth. And then he swung around in his chair and faced Jimmy.

“Might as well have this out!” he snapped. “As long as I’ve got anything to say about it, I’ll see that you’re well paid to keep out of mischief! This is a business for specialists who’ve been trained to the minute. You’re an amateur. You may have good stuff in you— probably have. The thing for you to do is to get out and prove it. You’re wasting your time here. Now you’ve got it straight. I’ve got nothing against you, Jimmy— I like you for your own sake, and because you’re your father’s son. But I don’t mix business and friendship— never have— never will.”

“Thanks! ” said Jimmy. “That’s straight talk—and it’s about time I got some! Now— I’ll say my piece. I’m going to stick around here until I’ve had a chance to show this office up. I’ve kept my eyes open— and you’ve passed up at least three chances to swing big deals in the last six months. There’s too much conservatism around here— too little disposition to take a chance. You don’t want to go into anything unless it’s a sure thing. That’s the trouble with all businesses that don’t bring in new blood once in a while. Good morning! ”

HE got out, leaving Trainor in danger of apoplexy. He went after Truesdale, the office manager; but Truesdale had a business engagement for lunch too, and so he had to put up with Fitch, the treasurer, a colorless, capable man, without any imagination whatever, who owed his position to his genius for the details of finance. And from Fitch, though the treasurer seemed a little dubious about imparting the information, Jimmy learned a good deal about building loans and the Trainor-Scott plan, since adopted by other concerns, of selling bonds in small denominations to finance the construction of apartment houses and office buildings.

He had no plan at that time. He didn’t know how he was going to find the material for the humble pie he proposed to bake for Trainor’s eating. But he had an idea that something would turn up, if he kept his eyes open. And something' did.

It was midsummer, and things were pretty dull. Vacations had reduced the office force. Trainor was fishing up in Canada— out of telegraphic touch. Truesdale was sitting on the lid; Fitch was mooning about; Jimmy was eating his head off. The combination of heat and idleness made Jimmy restless, and he went into Truesdale’s room to bait him.

“Say— I heard the other night that we’d had a chance to get an option on that block the Eastern Central’s got to have for its new terminal,” he said engagingly.

“Is that so, Mr. Truesdale?” Truesdale glared at him. That was a sore point with him— with Trainor too. The office had had advance information about the Eastern Central’s plan to invade the city— and hadn’t acted on the tip, with the result that a rival concern had been able to swing the biggest real-estate deal of a five-year period.

“Yes— it’s so,” said Truesdale. But then he smiled. “I’m not sure that the Northeastern Development Company’s so happy about it, though. That option hasn’t been exercised yet. Of course, they may simply want to hold up payment to save interest on the money— I don’t know the terms of the option, but they’ve probably got to tie up at least a hundred thousand for thirty days, maybe sixty, before they transfer title to the railroad.”

“There isn’t any hitch, is there?”

“I haven’t heard of any. I’m simply a little surprised to find that the transfer hasn’t been recorded. I’m not a mindreader, and I don’t try to work deductive processes.”

“Of course,” said Jimmy sympathetically. “Too bad we didn’t get in on that, though.”

“This office doesn’t go in for speculation— and that deal was strictly speculative!” said Truesdale with emphasis. “If you are disposed to criticize the management of the company, the time to do it is at the stock-holders’ meeting. Did you want to see me about business?”

Jimmy took the hint, and went out, whistling. And within an hour, though Jimmy didn’t know it until later, Truesdale was called away by a wire that announced that his wife had been taken suddenly and seriously ill in Maine. Jimmy got back from lunch, and within two minutes looked up to see Janet Cameron standing in his door.

“Mr. Truesdale left this note for you, Mr. Scott,” she said, coming in. He glanced at the few words of the memorandum.

“Too bad!” he said. “And I was ragging him just this morning! Jove— I’m sorry! Hope Mrs. Truesdale pulls through.”

“You’ll be in charge until Mr. Trainor or Mr. Truesdale gets back,” said Janet. Something in her voice made Jimmy stare at her. He wasn’t sure, but he thought she was smiling— a little— with her eyes.

“Hadn’t thought of that,” he said slowly. “Has any word gone to Mr. Trainor?”

“Not yet. Mr. Truesdale gave no orders. He was— upset, you see. Shall I have a telegram sent? It ought to reach Mr. Trainor in three or four days—”

“No!” said Jimmy explosively. He brought his hand down on his desk. “What’s a vice-president for?”

Now there was no doubt that Janet was smiling, though she said nothing at all.

“No!” said Jimmy again. “By Jove— I’m sorry about Mrs. Truesdale, of course— but I’ll crowd this as long as it lasts! How about it, Miss Cameron? You know the routine of the place. Will you act as my secretary as long as I’m in charge?”

“I’ll obey orders, of course, Mr. Scott,” she said sedately. “I suppose you’d like to look over the mail? Mr. Trainor’s and Mr. Truesdale’s? And will you sign the letters Mr. Truesdale had dictated before he went?”

JIMMY put in a busy and altogether delightful afternoon. It wasn’t solitary, either; Janet was in his room most of the time, explaining things. And he saw some men who had had appointments with Truesdale, and made one or two small decisions— decisions he was sure Truesdale wouldn’t have made without taking a week for thought!

Jimmy, being very much alone in the world, lived at his club. And that night, it happened that he had nothing to do, and so he stayed around the club after dinner, because it was too muggy and warm to seek amusement. There weren’t many men about, and he fell into conversation with Cheney, of the Northeastern Development Company, Trainor-Scott’s biggest rival in the real-estate and construction business in that section. Both companies operated on a large scale; neither allowed its business to be limited by local boundaries. Cheney was talkative, even a little noisy. It looked to Jimmy as if he had taken at least one extra drink at dinner— an unwise thing to do in such weather. Jimmy didn’t like Cheney much, and was glad when young Crampton came along and proposed a game of billiards. It was too hot, really, for billiards, but he accepted the challenge, to get rid of Cheney.

Cheney defeated his object, however. He turned up in the billiard-room, before long, with another man whom Jimmy didn’t know, and the pair of them sat down in big leather chairs and began drinking ginger-ale— which made Jimmy smile. Also, they talked— and it wasn’t long before snatches of their talk, which they made no effort to pitch low, came to his ears and made him frown. Cheney was talking about the Eastern Central terminal site, and he seemed-to be complaining of the rapacity of the owners of the land.

“Let ’em wait!” he said. “I tell you— money’s too tight. We’d have to borrow at about seven per cent. Got a lot tied up just now.”

The other man said something that was drowned out by a noise from the street.

“Not a chance!” That was Cheney again. “Who knows when the option runs out?”

He chuckled, and leaned forward, confidentially. But— he didn’t lower his voice. And Jimmy, prompted by some semi-chivalrous instinct, called to Cheney. “Hello— thought you’d gone home, Cheney!” he said, to attract Cheney’s atten¬ tion to his presence.

“Don’t you worry about me, Scott,” said Cheney with great solemnity. “I’m all right. You’ll have to get up mighty early tomorrow morning to be ahead of me!” And then he went on talking.

“Safe as a church!” he said. “We could jump in before anyone else could close a deal.”

A trolley car drowned out a few words. “—Canada— and Truesdale was called away today! We should worry—”

JIMMY was very thoughtful when he went home. He was on the verge of an idea. But— he didn’t feel disposed to take advantage of Cheney’s slip. Perhaps everything was fair in business, as in love and war. But— If Cheney hadn’t called him up, early the next morning, he probably would have banished the memory of the conversation he had been forced to overhear.

But Cheney did call him up—and his voice was keenly edged with anxiety.

“Hello— Scott?” His voice came thinly over the wire. “Say— last night— it was the heat, I guess— I don’t know. Did I make any fool crack talking to Burton? Don’t take anything I said seriously— there wasn’t anything to it! I was getting things mixed up—”

Jimmy hung up the receiver in a white blaze of anger. Cheney took it for granted that he, Jimmy, had meant to take advantage of him! And so he was trying to lie, now! If he had confessed, if he had asked Jimmy, as a matter of courtesy and decency, to forget what he had heard! But to descend to a trick— to assume that Jimmy meant to knife him!

“That cleans the slate!” said Jimmy to himself. “I’ve got his number now— and I’ll get him!”

He jabbed his finger viciously into the button that called Janet Cameron to his room.

“I’m going out,” he said. “Answer as much of the mail as you can. And please have everything in the office files about the Eastern Central terminal ready for me when I get back.”

His destination was the office of Landers, Spellman and Johns, the lawyers who represented the owners of the famous block that was to be the site of the E. C. terminal. His card took him at once to the room of Judge Landers.

“I understand the Northeastern’s option on the Eastern Central terminal site has expired,” he said without preface. That was a bluff— he wasn’t sure of the dating of the option. “I’ve come to make an offer for a thirty-day option.”

“I suppose you mean, when you say the Eastern Central terminal site, the property at Third and Market for which we are agents,” said Judge Landers with precision. “I have no knowledge as to the plans of the railway.” He paused, to let that sink in. He was much too dignified to wink, but he achieved the equivalent of a wink, somehow.

“The option has expired. I am prepared to give you a thirty-day option for fifty thousand dollars— that sum, of course, to apply upon the purchase price upon the consummation of the transaction.”

“Fifty thousand!” said Jimmy. He smiled feebly. “For an option!”

“You state the proposition correctly, Mr. Scott,” said the Judge.

“But— that’s not an option price! That’s a sale with a deposit!”

“Practically— yes. We don’t care to tie ourselves up with another option. We want to make sure of the sale. Having paid fifty thousand dollars down, you are not likely to forfeit and let the option lapse.”

JIMMY did some quick thinking. He knew what Trainor or Truesdale would say. But— this was his one chance. And even as he hesitated, a clerk came in and whispered to Landers.

“Tell Mr. Cheney I will see him as soon as I am free,” said the Judge.

“What?” He listened. “No— I am sorry that his business is pressing, but I am engaged with Mr. Scott.”

Jimmy swallowed hard and thought desperately. Judge Landers cleared his throat.

“Well, Mr. Scott?” he said. “I’ll take you up,” said Jimmy. “You’ll have to give me a couple of hours to make the payment— I suppose it’s got to be immediate?”

“I can give you until noon— on the basis of a preliminary agreement, to be signed at once.

Jimmy was a little dazed. He had to get fifty thousand dollars out of Fitch— but he thought he could do that. And he didn’t have time to think much. He signed the paper that Judge Landers drew up.

And on his way out, he met Cheney.

“I might have known you’d do this!” said Cheney bitterly. “I’ll get square with you yet, Scott!”

That braced Jimmy up, and did him a lot of good. He went back to his own office and went for Fitch, who turned pale. “But— the terms are preposterous!” he said. “I’m surprised that they didn’t jack up the price— but fifty thousand dollars for the option! Mr. Trainor would never consent—”

“Trainor’s fishing!” Jimmy interrupted brusquely. “I know I’m supposed to be a figurehead— but you’ll remember that I’m vice-president, with full power to act in Trainor’s absence. I’ll assume full responsibility— and I’ll countersign that check as soon as you have it made out. Have it certified and get it to Landers, quick!”

JANET was waiting in Jimmy’s room when he entered it, after leaving a crushed and dazed Fitch behind him.

“I just got this wire from Mr. Truesdale,” she said, holding out a slip of yellow paper to him. “He instructs me to notify Mr. Trainor at once of his being called away.”

“Ignore it!” snapped Jimmy. “Get Mr. Vane, of the Eastern Central, on long distance and make an appointment for me to see him as soon as possible. Have some one look up trains.”

She stared at him. The new crispness in his voice, the defiant carriage of his head, seemed to intrigue her. But she went out at once.

He found the papers about the Eastern Central project on his desk, and went through them. And in about fifteen minutes Janet was back.

“I spoke to Mr. Vane’s secretary,” she said. “There’s a train in ten minutes from the West Station. If you catch it, you can see Mr. Vane as soon as you get in. He’ll wait for you. I’ve sent for a taxicab.”

“Fine!” he said. Briefly, he told her what he had done. She caught her breath, once, and grew vivid in her interest. “Remember what eld Shakespeare said, Miss Cameron? About the tide in the affairs of men? This looks like it, doesn’t it?”

“Oh— I hope so, Mr. Scott!” she said. “Because— of course— Mr. Trainor wouldn’t have done it— he’d have been afraid there was something fishy—”

He shrugged his shoulders. “Can’t think about that!” he said. “I won't have time to fuss with this mail. Let’s see— what train can I get back?”

“Four o’clock,” she said promptly. “It gets you here at seven.”

IN two minutes more he was off— satisfied that the check would reach Landers in time. He caught his train with seconds to spare. In a little more than three hours he was received by President Vane of the Eastern Central. And in five minutes more he was reeling under the knowledge that he had made a blunder that was irretrievable— that he had saddled upon the TrainorScott Company a piece of property that would probably break the world’s record for white elephants. For— the Eastern Central terminal project had been abandoned!

There was finality in Vane’s crisp words.

“It looks as if you’d been tricked, Scott,” he said. “I’m sorry. Your information was correct— so far as it went. If we could, we’d take that block and go ahead. But it’s all off. We’re blocked on our right of way. The Suburban Traction Company in your town owns property we’ve got to cross. Control of its stock is in the hands of the T. K. and V. Suburban, and they absolutely refuse consent to our construction! And there you are! It’s a holdup. We might win in condemnation proceedings—we might not. We wont take the chance or put up a fight. We’ll wait and come in later.”

Jimmy never knew just how he made his way from Vane’s office, or what he did in the time he had to wait before his train was ready. The fact that he forgot that he hadn’t had any lunch, and so was faint from hunger when he got off the train at home, didn’t occur to him. He walked along the platform to the exit gate with sagging shoulders and hanging head. And he never saw Janet Cameron until, with a little cry of concern, she touched his elbow.

“Mr. Scott!” she said. “What’s the matter?”

“Why— what —how is it you’re here?” he asked stupidly.

“I was anxious— I wanted to know what success you had had,” she said. “I stayed late at the office, and came right over here to meet your train—”

“Success!” he repeated, and laughed bitterly. “Miss Cameron, you’re looking at the biggest fool in the United States!”

“I am not!” she said furiously. “Mr. Scott— tell me what has happened!”

And then she looked at him more carefully, saw how pale and tired he was, and the big dark circles under his eyes.

“Mr. Scott—  have you had anything to eat since breakfast?”

“I—I guess not,” he said dully. “I don’t want anything.”

She thought for a moment. “I do,” she said. “Won't you— won't you take me somewhere for dinner? I was so rushed that I didn’t get much lunch—”

That roused him, as she had hoped it would.

“Oh, I say— of course— come on!” he said. “Let’s go over to the Westcott. What a beastly shame! I’ve got you all messed up, too—”

GENTLY, skillfully, she managed him, made him order for himself by forcing him to take thought of her. With deliberate intention she ceased to be Miss Cameron, stenographer, and became Janet Cameron, a girl he was taking to dinner. And not until there was cold consommé before them and she had, turning away her head to hide her smile, seen him absentmindedly devour a roll, would she let him tell her what had happened. She listened quietly; at the poignant revelation of his abasement she put out her hand instinctively, and touched his with a gesture that was full of a pity almost maternal.

“Oh— I was so afraid this morning!” she said. “So afraid there was some trick—”

You were?” he said. “But you didn’t say anything?”

“You’d made your decision— the responsibility was yours,” she said, meeting his eyes. “And I didn’t know what I was afraid of.”

“Well—there it is,” he said hopelessly. “And—do you know, what makes me mad¬ dest is the pettiness of it—the way a great public improvement is kept from the city because of the selfishness of the T. K. and V. people— who control Suburban Traction!”

“Suburban Traction,” she said thoughtfully.

“That’s funny! I’m helping to block it— because I own forty shares of that stock myself. A lot of people do own small blocks of it—”

A sudden light came into her eyes, and she stared at him. There was a tense eagerness about her, all at once. Her fingers beat nervously upon the cloth. She seemed to be trying to influence him without speech. And suddenly he stirred, uncomfortably, and met her eyes.

“You— own forty— shares!” he said. “And other. I say—Miss Cam¬ eron, do you know what is meant by control, as a rule? About a thirty-five or forty-per-cent holding of stock— all in one place! With all the little stockholders sending in their proxies for meetings!” He straightened up.

“By Jove!” he said. “I wonder! Janet!”

That came out unconsciously, and she never even showed that she noticed it. “Will you do something for me? Make over your stock to me— at once— tomorrow morning?”

“Yes!” she said. “Oh—I was so afraid I’d have to suggest that!”

“There isn’t one chance in a million— but isn’t it worth trying?” he said, all on fire. “I might have known you’d see it. You—” His voice was unsteady. “What a wonder you are! ”

“I’m not!” she said. “But—oh, I do want you to pull through! And— I didn’t tell you before— until you’d braced up! But— Mr. Trainor’ll be back day after tomorrow. Mr. Truesdale wired him, and it happened to catch him.”

“Day after tomorrow?” said Jimmy. “Let him come! Hello— steak? Good— I could eat a horse! Janet—”

He caught himself and flushed. “Oh, I say— I didn’t mean that— Miss Cameron— you don’t know what you’ve done for me!”

“Janet,” she said with shining, laughing eyes, “as long as it isn’t in the office! I do like it, you know! And, anyway, I’ve broken every rule I made when I went into business into smithereens tonight!”

He took her home in a taxicab, in spite of mild protests that weren’t very convincing. And he stayed long enough to meet her mother.

“I’ve heard so much about you, Mr. Scott!” said Mrs. Cameron. “Janet’s spoken more about you than about anyone in the office, lately.”

And because she was Janet, she only smiled, and didn’t lower her eyes when he looked at her triumphantly.

IT was perfectly inevitable that reaction should follow the exaltation that had held him up while he was still with Janet. He had a wretched night— a night in which he went over, again and again, all the things that might go wrong.

And in the morning, before he would even take the stock certificate Janet tendered him, he got Vane on the long-distance telephone, and told him what he planned.

“Well— I don’t know,” said Vane dubiously. “We’d about decided to pass it all up for the present, Scott. Still— if you could get Suburban Traction into line—”

Jimmy cut loose then; and Vane surrendered.

“You’ll have to hustle!” he said. “But if you can put it over, we’ll go ahead!”

Within an hour Jimmy was a stockholder of record, and engaged in exercising his newly acquired right to copy a list of stockholders. And the rest of that day he spent in an activity so feverish that he never could remember, afterward, half the things he had done. When he had to quit, at ten o’clock at night, he was on the verge of exhaustion. But he knew that the morning ought to tell the story. The controlling interest had let him get a start; but by midafternoon he had been fighting for the proxies he got, and he knew the final struggle in the morning would be the real thing. He had worked miracles. By appealing to local pride and civic interest, he had secured proxies from forty per cent of the stock— as much as the controlling interest had. With five or six per cent more, allowing for scattering absentees who would never vote, he was probably assured of victory in a special meeting of stockholders that he already had the power to demand. He wanted to finish his work before Trainor got back. But he couldn’t. Trainor got in late that night instead of at the time named—he descended upon Scott at seven o’clock in the morning.

“You wanted a chance— and you got it!” he stormed. “You walked into the trap Cheney set for you— you’re the laughing-stock of the town! Cheney and Landers framed you— Landers to make the sale, Cheney to save the two or three thousand dollar forfeit they had up and, I suppose, to split commission with Landers if we paid their price! Well— anything to say?”

“Nothing, yet,” said Jimmy, “—except that you’ve got to get out now and let me alone. I’m going to be busy.”

“Stay away from the office!” snapped Trainor. “I’m a patient man, but— I’m going to arrange a compromise with Landers. We’re hooked, and I’ll admit it, and throw myself on his mercy.”

Jimmy said nothing. He was a little too nervous for speech. He went to work instead. And by eleven o’clock he knew that he was, in all human probability, beaten. A last block of five hundred shares had eluded him. If the majority—the nominal majority— holders had secured it, he was through. And its holder had sold an hour before Jimmy had reached him.

“I don’t know who bought it,” said the owner’s wife. “Give me a telephone number where he can get you, and I’ll have him let you know.”

DISPIRITED, Jimmy gave the club number and went there. He didn’t expect a phone call— but it came. The man who had sold those all-important shares called him up and gave him the purchaser’s name.

“Cheney!” he cried into the instrument, and hung up the receiver.

“Right here!” said Cheney himself, behind him. He grinned and held out his hand. “No hard feelings, Scott? I played it pretty low-down on you— but you were trying to put one over on me, you know, or you wouldn’t have swallowed my bait!”

Jimmy stared at him. Then, on a sudden impulse, he spoke. “Have you bought some Suburban Traction?” he asked.

“On you!” Cheney said. “Salted away some of my winnings. Why?”

Jimmy weighed the chances— blurted out his story, or part of it. “Will you give me an option?” he said. “It can’t hurt you— and it will save me!”

Cheney stared at him. Bewilderment, scorn, finally a dawning admiration struggled in his expression. And suddenly he laughed out and thrust out his hand:

“Damned if I don’t!” he cried.

Jimmy reeled for just a second. And then he waited, while Cheney scrawled his signature. Jimmy walked on air to the office. He went in with his head up, and he saw how Janet went white, first, and then flushed, as she saw the look in his eyes. He grinned at her, and strode into his office. And he pressed, continuously, until the door opened, the push-button that summoned her.

“Come in!” he said unsteadily. “And shut that door! Janet— I’ve got ’em! Fifty-one per cent of the stock— irrevocable proxies!”

“Oh— Jimmy!” she cried. That office was just as private as it had ever been. But Jimmy Scott had something to do!

______________________

11: The Secret of Banda Sea

Clarence Herbert New

Blue Book, April 1934

IT can be hot among the Moluccas in March, five degrees south of the equator. The ship’s Dutch passengers lounged about during the middle of the day in gaudy batik pajamas and sarongs, the English and Americans in white-linen trousers, shirts and negligees— all according to custom in the Dutch Indies. Bremerton and Joyce had their deck-chairs lashed to the thwartship-rail right away aft, and were smoking brown-paper cigarettes from Manila, drinking iced limeade, and exchanging a word or two when something aside from the heat occurred to them.

“Been noticing that mate O’Brien, Joyce?” Bremerton asked one day. “Hmph! Pretty smooth. Thinks well of himself. Civil enough, but superior airs— rat’s eyes, too near together. Don’t like the way he acts toward the Old Man. Not quite insubordinate, carries out his orders— but with a manner as if for ten cents he’d tell the Cap’n to go to hell. And Tietjen is a decent old chap, too.

“D’ye know, I wonder if the Cap’n hasn’t reason for some anxiety. We took aboard a lot of bag-sugar at Ceram before we got to Banda Neira. Tietjen had no space for it but the lower Number Two hold. If we get a lot of water in the bilges, the trickle higher up is going to reach the lower tier of those sugar bags and liquefy the stuff until it goes through the gunny-meshes and lets down another tier which, in turn, liquefies. I may be wrong in the impression, but I doubt if you can pump liquid sugar out through the limbers with the bilge-water— too heavy, likely to clog. If you can’t, that heavy stuff shifts with every motion of the boat, and makes a serious risk of her turning turtle if a sea hits her right.

“There’s another point which I’d say is bothering Tietjen: Aside from the Dutch, we’ve got some pretty fine English and American women aboard— and three damfool ones: New York society women who are traveling through the Orient with five or six trunks apiece, and enough jewelry for a Hindu idol. Of course Tietjen is keeping the stones for them in the specie-vault under the purser’s office, but if there happen to be a few nervy adventurers aboard, they’ll have a go at ’em, sure as shooting!”

Joyce had been lazily watching the approach of a great mother billow, rolling majestically up from the Arafura Sea— rather enjoyably anticipating the massive lift of it when it reached the boat. But instead of taking it with a long easy roll, the Van Joort appeared to be as sluggish as a fattening hog; when she did finally roll, there was a sound of loose articles sliding down to leeward on the various decks, and she seemed in two minds about ever straightening up again.

A slight frown deepened between the American’s eyes. He got slowly out of his deck-chair and looked down over the rail at the side-plating.

“Hmph! There’s something loose in the lower holds, Bremerton! She’s certainly a good foot lower in the water than she was at Banda Neira!”

THE chief engineer’s head appeared above the coaming of the after-companion as Joyce went below for tobacco, and Bremerton beckoned him over to the other man’s empty chair.

The passengers were scattered about under the awning, mostly napping— none of them near enough to overhear what was said between the two.

“Wanted to have a bit of talk with you, Chief. Her Plimsoll’s almost under water— and she’s moving as heavy as Mark Twain’s jumping frog. Can’t you get that sugar out of the Number Two with lines of hose down the hatch from a donkey-pump?”

“Py tamn, Mynheer Bremerton! So— you wass not sleeping all t’e time, wass you! I try donkey-pump when it iss dark— vill not so mooch alarm t’e women; but t’e donkey vill nodt raise t'e stuff so high— get clog, pesides. W’en she roll, t’e stuff all roll ofer to loo’ard—t’e sta’board hose suck not’ingk but air. W’en she roll t’e ot’er way—same t’ing; pump suck more air as sugar. Lucky eet iss nodt in pallast-tanks, or t’e limbers wouldt clog. You got sense enough not talk wit’ passengers—ja?”

“No—I’m just looking ahead to avoid panic, if it can be done. Another point, while you’re here: I’ve been having a quiet look-see at these boats. Number Two and Number Eight are pretty well eaten through with rust. I suppose they might stay afloat for a while if you kept bailing— but there wouldn’t be any let-up to it. How about the others?”

“T’ree— fife— six— wass new poats. We indent for t’em last voyage— find ’em waiting at Surabaya. T’e ot’ers wouldt keep afloat.”

“About as I figured it— two boats would carry all the passengers with an officer and four men each. Say, Wooermans— has O’Brien been hobnobbing with any of the crew particularly, more than the others?”

“T’ere wass two— ja. My second assistant andt a quartermaster. Vandererg, t’e second mate, iss fine chap— good nawigator, haf no use for t’e mate. I t’ink t’ose two wass all t’e pals O’Brien got—andt t’ey wass cookin’ somet’ingk —I dunno what! ”

“Noticed the glass—since noon?”

“Yess— put t’at haze andt t’e long oily schwell tell me as much as t’e glass. We get plenty dirty weat’er pefore morningk. Air feels like typhoon comingk —not pad as China Sea, perhaps, but shake-up t’is oldt poat a lot.”

Joyce carrie along the deck to them, and Wooermans went below to his engines.

“Say, Joyce! Is it all my imagination —or are you getting a sort of feeling that something’s going to happen before long?”

“Frankly, old chap, I’m nervous as a cat! Thought mebbe I’d been smoking too much— one does, out here. There’s one thing dead sure: we’ll get a blow before morning, and it won’t be any zephyr, either. Aside from that— oh, well, I guess I could bear up if I never saw that bird O’Brien again— he sure makes my fur stand out! ”

“Got a gun with you?”

“Service automatic I had in France. Why? What’s the idea?”

BREMERTON looked a bit sheepish.

“Hm—blessed if I know. Only I seem to have the same hunch you have! Say! You go belt that gun on under your coat, right now, and put a box of shells into your pocket— I’ll do the same. Get a saw, two axes, couple of files, pliers, from the Chief, and stow ’em in the stern of the Number Five boat. Get the second mate off in some corner— tell him in case anything does happen, we want him in command of that same boat— with all the passengers in the Numbers Five and Six— both of which are new. The Two and Eight will leak like sieves! I’ll look around quietly for a few other things that’ll come in handy in case of emergency. Mebbe we’re both plumb silly, buffaloed over nothing— but there seem to be a few symptoms aboard this old hooker that don’t look so good—to me. There are some nice women aboard that I don’t want to see hurt in any way— yes, and those cute little Dutch kids!”

The Van Joort rolled sluggishly on her way, most of the passengers napping through the afternoon in their deck-chairs. A few minutes after eight-bells had gone, the sharp crack of a heavy pistol came from somewhere in the upper part of the boat. Without a motion save a slight turning of their heads toward each other, the two Americans opened their eyes with questioning glances.

“Where was that, Bremerton? Bridge? Captain’s cabin?”

“Sounded like that to me— don’t believe the other passengers noticed it. If they were all asleep, they wouldn’t. Hmph! Let’s quietly stroll up on the bridge—and see what happened.”

Vanderberg, the second mate, had the watch; but O’Brien was standing at the head of the ladder as they started up it.

“What do you gentlemen want? Can’t come up here, you know— against the comp’ny regulations! ”

“Talk a bit lower, O’Brien— you don’t want to start a panic among the passengers. We’re coming up to see about that shot, just now— both of us happen to be large shareholders in the Line, so we’ll not argue rules and regulations with you. Was that shot fired in the Old Man’s cabin— or wasn’t it? Move out of the way, will you!”

“Say! You chaps fancy you’re God Almighty, don’t you? You heard me say you couldn’t come up on. this bridge— an’ that settles it! ”

“Less of that sort of talk, O’Brien! The wireless is working— I’m a pretty fast code-operator myself. Just a little more nonsense, and you won’t last two hours as mate! Get that? You’re not in command of this boat, you know.”

“Well, Mister— as it happens, I am! Old Tietjen has just blown his brains out! He’s been practically out of his head for a week past—something on his mind, I fancy.”

“Then you’d better come in with us to look at him. It’s very much to your interest to do that, you know— witnesses to verify what you say. And I think we’ll have Vanderberg, too. We’ll examine the Captain— have a look around his cabin. Where were you when the shot was fired?”

“Just coming up the ladder for a word with the Old Man— Vanderberg was over at the sta’board end of the bridge. I asked him who fired the shot, but he didn’t know— fancied it was on one of the decks below. Then I opened the Captain’s door an’ looked in. I’d just closed it when you started to come up.”

“All right—come along! We’ll go in and have a look at him.”

TIETJEN was sitting in his swivel chair at the transom-desk— turned partly around as if speaking to somebody at the door— his right shoulder and head sagged over on the desk; a round blueblack hole started from the center of his forehead. In the right hand, stretched out on the desk, was an automatic— with his thumb on the trigger, and the barrel pointing toward his head. Bremerton and Joyce made a careful inspection of the room. The second mate stood over near the body waiting to carry out any orders given him, but his eyes were busy and didn’t miss much. Presently Bremerton said:

“Of course in this climate, O’Brien, you’ll have to give him a sea-burial— but I think Doctor Boeverie had better come up and go through the Captain’s personal belongings—take charge of them. The Doctor is an intimate friend of the managing director at Surabaya. If you’ll find Boeverie and send him up here, we’ll help him to lay poor old Tietjen out and write memoranda of his stuff. You’ll have your hands full looking after the boat, tonight— from the way the glass is acting. If any question comes up outside of the navigating end, better see us about it.”

O’Brien was only too well pleased to get out of that gruesome cabin and stay out. He didn’t know how much of Bremerton’s claim to being one of the owners of the line was pure bluff, or whether the Head Office really would confirm him in any authority he chose to take upon himself— but the American had the quiet assured air of a man who was a power in some part of the world, and O’Brien was satisfied to remain in command of the boat without argument, even if only for the time being. Vanderberg had remained after he went out, to ask if there was anything they wanted him to do. Bremerton nodded.

“Yes, Van— we want to show you something. But keep it quiet for the present until we find out what’s going to happen. First— look at this gun. Could Tietjen have fired at merely the length of his arm from his head without having powder-burns all over his face? That one point settles it! You were not in here— we saw you on the bridge when the shot was fired. None of the passengers would have attempted going up the ladder, knowing the rules as they do. Nobody else but O’Brien was up here. I’m wrapping up this gun in a bit of newspaper and taking it below where I can blow some flour against it— I got a good camera in my stateroom. I’m also taking along the Captain’s sheet of the Banda and Arafura seas, with his copy of the Admiralty Sailing Directions for the Eastern Archipelago. There are duplicates in the chart-room, so you’ll not need these for navigating.”

AFTER assisting Dr. Boeverie for an hour, they went below and hunted up the purser, Nijhoff, whom they found in his combination office and stateroom opening upon the saloon-gangway. The grilled window through which he did business with the passengers had a steel shutter which was always closed at other times, so that unless he opened his door, nobody could tell whether there was anyone in his room or not. Locking the door, Joyce and Bremerton got down to business:

“Nijhoff, the Old Man’s dead— apparently blew his own brains out, from the way things look—which leaves O’Brien in command. Actually— O’Brien shot him in cold blood. He has two cronies aboard who seem to be just about his type. Joyce and I are pretty sure those three are cooking up some way to get the jewels and money in your specievault— the jewels alone would run up into the hundreds of thousands. Now— is there any place about this room where that stuff can be hidden if you take it out of the vault under this deck? If it’s a place where there’s practically no chance for anybody to look, it doesn’t need to be protected in any way— you simply take the chance that nobody will look for it.”

“Suppose t’ey holdt gun against my belly—ask where iss jewels?”

“Say the Captain came to you yesterday— worried about the stuff, made you get it out, took it all up to his cabin, where he probably had some place to hide it.”

“H-m-m— yess— t’at might work. Pecause I open t’e vault for t’em— t’ey see he iss empty— I say search my room andt my office. Ja! You weesh to know where I hide t’e stuff?”

“No— just as well that we don’t. But we do want your promise that you’ll take it out of that vault as! soon as we leave you. O’Brien and the crew will have their hands full tonight— too full to go after the jewels; but they’re figuring out some scheme which is good enough to work under normal conditions.”

As the pair left the purser’s office, the bugle sounded for dinner. When Joyce had changed his shirt and coat, he stepped along into Bremerton’s suite and asked if he was figuring on letting the mate and his cronies succeed.

“Not in the final show-down— hell, no! But just at present we can’t do a damned thing. Suppose we have a conference with the Chief and several of the crew— ask ’em to help us chuck those pirates in the brig until we get to port? How do we know that others aren’t in cahoots with ’em? How can we prove the murder against O’Brien to convince ’em? We’re asking ’em to mutiny against the officer in command of the ship— well, the Chief and Vanderberg are the only two of the lot who would risk it; the rest would obey O’Brien’s orders and lock us up instead! Take the passengers: We’d be asking them to back us up against a gang of scoundrels who’ll shoot any or all of them without a moment’s hesitation— and on account of the women, even if they had the nerve themselves, they won’t do it. We’ve got to play along until we get that gang right— swallow what they say, do what they make us do, until we can hang ’em without any slip-up.”

IN spite of the electrically-driven punkas, the air in the saloon was breathless; there was an uneasy motion to the long deep-water swell. After dinner there was a coppery color in the sky— black clouds banking up against it. In another hour the typhoon broke upon them— not with the full strength of the China Sea breed, but with plenty to send many a Malay junk to the bottom.

Well-found steamers in these days will stand pretty much anything Father Neptune hatches up, but when one’s plates and rivets are bitten with rust, she does take in more water than is good for her equilibrium; and the Van Joort had loaded in more of the Banda Sea than her builders ever intended.

By morning the typhoon, of which only the outer edge had struck them, disappeared to the eastward, but it left a sea which kept pounding the sides of the logy old craft until evening. Although she was noticeably lower in the water, none of the passengers were apprehensive— they didn’t know enough about conditions below to be so.

JOYCE was talking after dinner with the Chief, who was confident that as the sea went down, he would be able to get the liquid sugar out. But at midnight repeated blasts upon the siren brought everyone on deck in more or less panic. The mate told them that there was danger of the water in the holds shifting so suddenly that it would turn the boat upside-down, in which case there would be no possible chance for saving them. With more or less distant islands all around them, a few days in the boats at the most would get them safely ashore. This meant, of course, losing all the baggage they had on board, but he pointed out that the line was perfectly good for all legal claims they brought against it. Joyce asked him if anyone who wished to take the chance could remain on board; but O’Brien saw the trap and dodged it.

“Certainly, Mr. Joyce— but at his or her own risk. Neither the Company nor I will assume any responsibility if they do so.” (And Joyce muttered to an acquaintance among the Dutch passengers that anyone who did stay aboard probably wouldn’t be alive in the morning. Take that any way you like. He had noticed that the mate was sending everyone but his two cronies off in the boats.)

Vanderberg was in command of the Number Five boat; Wooermans had the Number Six— all the passengers being in those two. In the other four, were the stewards, oil-tenders, greasers, deckhands and petty officers, with a dozen Malays from the Asiatic steerage.

When the Five and Six were close together at the start, Bremerton said: “We’re heading a bit east of south for Roma or Damma, Chief, and I think you’d better come with us— keeping In sight all the time. Let those in the other boats go anywhere they like. They can’t go far without hitting something. There’s good drinking water on Roma, and a Koninklijke boat from Damma every three months picking up copra, I suppose.”

“Ja— andt shell in t’e years when she iss nodt tabu. I say— Mynheer Bremerton— t’ere iss one leetle choke on t’e mate! He haf save’ T’e Numper Two andt Numper Eight poats for himself andt his pals!”

“Guess he had other things on his mind and forgot to examine the boats. I hinted to the crew that those two should be left specially for the mate. They supposed it was his order— left the Two and Eight very much alone. There’s a life-raft if O’Brien can get back to it after starting in those boats. Hmph!.... I’ll laugh if they drown within fifty feet of the steamer!” .

The passengers were stunned by the suddenness and completeness of the catastrophe, as it seemed to them. From sleeping in security on what they supposed a perfectly stanch and comfortable boat, with all the little conveniences of civilization, to finding themselves in open boats with just the clothing and blankets they could hurriedly pick up in the short time they had— with open sea all around them, and possibly death from hunger and thirst before they reached land— that was a jolt. Most of them took it philosophically; but the three New York society women were— much displeased: It was nothing short of an outrage to passengers of their social position— the Company wouldn’t hear the last of it for a long time!

When the tirade presently subsided, Bremerton quietly said: “Ladies—I think most of us will agree that the situation rather called for some¬ thing in the way of comic relief. Thank you very much. Er— Claus! Mina! Come over and sit on my lap for a while— I’ll tell you all about the circus.”

THE two children, who bravely had been trying to avoid a quiet cry, by themselves, brightened a little and shyly crawled along to him.

“What circus, Mynheer Bremerton— if you please?”

“Why this one, of course! Aren’t we all playing at being animals— and acrobats and— er, yes— clowns? And having adventures that we can tell folks about as long as we live? Why— when you grow up and remember this voyage on the old Van Joort, you’ll say you wouldn’t have missed it for anything! And tomorrow—yes, I think before night— we’ll probab’ly come to one of those lovely islands you sometimes see in your dreams— with monkeys and parrots and gulls, cool, shady places under the trees— the perfume of beautiful flowers in the air. And when we go ashore, we’ll build a big bonfire of driftwood, and have some hot coffee—I’m sure about that, ’cause I put a bag of it in the for’ard end of the boat, myself, with a big coffee-pot. An’ we can dig up clams and fry ’em—”

As the children chuckled delightedly in anticipation, one of the Dutch planters quietly asked: “Do your fairy dreams ever come true, Mynheer Bremerton? Me— I am nodt so goot sailor. I wondter how can you pe so sure we get to landt again!”

“Oh—I must tell you about that, Mynheer. I fetched with me a navigating chart for these waters— Vanderberg fetched along his sextant and chronometers. When we took to the boats, we were seventy miles nor’-nor’- west from Damma Island—which has a smoking volcano. Sou’-west of Damma is Roma Island—precipitous in all but one spot, where there’s a river-mouth and bay—fine drinking water. There were two small native villages a few years ago, but at last accounts the natives seem to have cleared out for some reason— possibly raided from some other island. Anyhow, there’s a string of little islands sixty-five miles south of us, all the way to Timor— don’t see how we can miss them. We’re going to rig a lug-sail out of the canvas boat-cover— good breeze astern. When the sun gets pretty hot, we’ll use the canvas for an awning—row underneath it.”

FOR a while those in the boat speculated upon what they might find on whatever island they struck; then they snuggled down as comfortably as they could and went to sleep. With the little sail and the tailwind, the boat made even better time than Vanderberg had hoped— averaging at least eight knots through the night.

By ten in the morning an island was in sight off to port, where, according to the Admiralty Sailing Directions, they should have sighted the volcano, whether it was smoking or not. But there was no peak of that sort. The shores were precipitous, with surf breaking against them, the summit appearing to be over a thousand feet high in spots, thickly wooded.

Coasting along the western end, they saw no break in the rocky cliffs; nor was there any on the south side. But there was a beach and lagoon at the easterly end, with coral-reefs outside, and in one place there was an easy grass and bush covered slope down from the cliff-top.

Rowing in through a narrow but safe opening in the reef, they beached the boats and found a spring of crystal clear water at the foot of the rocks, with some underground outlet— the pool being about forty feet across and the water trickling down the face of the rock in several good-sized jets. Just outside of the reefs, in very deep water, a rocky islet covered with trees poked eight hundred feet of height above the sea and extended more than two miles along the east coast of the main island, making as lovely a marine view as any of them ever had seen. In no way except its precipitous cliffs did the place resemble the description of Roma. It certainly was not Roma—not much over half the length. It wasn’t Damma. It wasn’t one of the Serwattis.

Before sundown they had pretty well explored the top, finding traces of occupation by some of the Melanesian natives, but no living human beings. Animals of various sorts—monkeys, birds, peccaries, a species of iguana. Only a few of the Dutch and three or four of the other men were permitted to go on that first exploration, as nobody knew just what dangers might exist on the island. When they returned, Dr. Leyden— a famous botanist and anthropologist who had been studying for several months in the wonderful Botanic Gardens at Buitenzorg— presently noticed and carefully examined an immense idol, carved from a single massive tree-trunk, which stood against the base of the cliff, partly hidden by vines. When he had finished his inspection, he took Bremerton and some of the other men aside:

“As you may have heard, mynheers, I make exhaustive study of Melanesian and Polynesian races as well as plants. This idol— I know him very well. He is an idol which is carved to propitiate some terrible and unknown danger which is taking life after life among the natives. When the idol seem not making much impression on the mysterious danger, the natives all clear out, so as to give him all the room he need in the fight. When they come by in proas an’ see idol still in same place, they think it still unsafe to come ashore— and go ’way again. So— what that idol say to us is this: ‘There is something terrible— very dangerous to human life— on this island.’ We do not know what. Perhaps we find out— perhaps not. But we must not relax vigilance night or day—an’ we must make our camp some distance away from that idol—preferably on the top-level of the island, because he is down here by lagoon, where natives believe the danger was worst. We saw no snakes in our exploration— so it is not poisonous snake. The animals here are too small for attack unless cornered. However— we take all precautions, and we see.”

BREMERTON admitted something like an atmosphere of hidden menace had struck him when they came in and beached their boats—not so noticeable on the upper level, because the monkeys, birds and animals did not seem aware of it. At the top of the cliff where it rose sheer from the lagoon was a grassy space overhung by a massive ledge of projecting rock to an extent which made it almost a cave and gave complete shelter against rain or wind from west, north or east— a small fissure at the back making a natural and perfect draft for their fire when it was lighted. Before evening the entire party were more or less comfortably settled in the place, the boat-covers screening off a private section for the women, the boats themselves hauled up the beach on rollers, and laid bottom-side-up against the hase of the rocks.

THE officers and the Americans noticed the same breathless feeling in the air just before sunset which had preceded the typhoon, and agreed that the stormcenter might be working down toward them. When the rest settled down to sleep, Bremerton and Nijhoff were standing watch—being relieved at eight-bells by Vanderberg and the Chief. At four in the morning they told Joyce and Dr. Leyden, who relieved them, that they had heard what sounded like shouts for help down on the beach, and the second mate stole quietly down to the foot of the cliffs while Wooermans remained guarding the camp.

The starlight was bright enough to make out the beach and lagoon pretty well, but there was no sign of any human being in sight. After sunrise four of the party went down—and discovered footprints indicating that somebody had come down the path in the night to sleep on the soft sand of the beach. They found where he had been lying, with hollows scooped out for his shoulders and hips— and from that spot a large blurred and sprawling track down into the lagoon. It resembled nothing they ever had seen— much wider than the track of a boat being dragged up, but not as deep in the sand.

When they returned to the camp above, some one remarked that nobody had seen Hans Bornje, one of the sailors who had been rowing in the Number Five boat— and asked if they had seen him. Before starting to get a breakfast ready, a party of six went out along the main trail shouting Bornje’s name until they reached the other end of the island, but all they heard in response was a chattering of abuse from monkeys and parrots. Dr. Leyden called their attention to the point that if Bornje’s body had been lying anywhere in the jungle, the little forest people would have been deathly quiet in that immediate vicinity —as also they would if the sailor had been walking along through the bush. Shout at a monkey or parrot, and he’ll gather his clan to return abuse with interest— but move quietly, and he’ll pretend he just isn’t there.

By noon it was admitted that Bornje must have been killed down on the beach by the mysterious demon of the island, whatever it might be, and dragged into the lagoon. This was sufficient to dampen the spirits of the entire party and terrorize some of the more nervous women. The men, of course— all but the remaining six of the seamen— were too well educated to believe there was anything supernatural about the occurrence, but they couldn’t help speculating as to whether the fish or saurian might not be too big to be put out of business with pistols.

As darkness fell, with the suddenness peculiar to the tropics, zigzag streaks of lightning along the horizon were incessant, the air became more breathless, and the stars were blotted out by a rapidly rising black pall. Then— when all of them were safely huddled way back under the ledge— the typhoon struck the island, tearing up good-sized trees by the roots and hurling them out into the sea, deluging it with torrential rain until streams of water poured down the faces of the precipices on every side. This continued pretty well through the night, until the center of the typhoon whirled off to the east and north on its circular course.

BY sunrise, the force of the wind had subsided; by six bells it had died away entirely, and Bremerton, the Chief and Dr. Leyden came out upon the edge of the cliff for a look around. But their eyes were not above the brow of the precipice when the New Yorker hastily grasped their arms and stopped them from showing any more of their heads. For there below, jammed down upon the inner reef until her bottom plates were crushed up into her ballast tanks, was the old Van Joort— at least fifty feet of her stern overhanging deep water in the lagoon, and another sixty or seventy feet of her starboard side on the edge of it. Either the size and force of the waves had lifted her completely over a submerged notch in the outer reef, or she had been carried through some narrow opening— slewed around stern-first, lifted on the crests of the mighty breakers and slammed down upon the inner ring of coral with such force that any salvage of the hull would cost double what it had to build her.

FOR a few moments the keen eyes above examined every foot of her superstructure, but there was no visible sign of life. Presently Bremerton said:

“The Numbers Two and Eight boats are still at their davits—I remember they Were securely lashed. The raft was on the turtle-deck aft, and that’s gone, evidently washed overboard— pulled those big steel cleats out by the roots when it went. O’Brien and his cronies are still on board if they weren’t washed off during the night— which isn’t at all likely. They couldn’t do anything but steer her ahead of the blow and go it blind— no fire in the Diesels. Well— the first point which must be impressed upon all of the folks is that they mustn’t show one inch of themselves where they can be seen from the boat! They must thoroughly understand that O’Brien murdered the Captain, cold-bloodedly. If any one of us gets ashore in a civilized port, he and the other two will hang. They’ll shoot us down one by one if they get the chance! There’s no blinking that. Those three men know they’ve got to die unless we do first!

“I think it very likely that our two boats are pretty well covered with sand blown over them at the foot of the rock during the night, so those brutes aren’t likely to notice anything that would make them suspect we’re here. One of us must remain constantly on watch, night and day, so that we know exactly when they come ashore— which they’ll certainly be doing in a few hours. When they do, we don’t permit them to come up this path— absolutely not! Fire on ’em if they try it— and shoot to kill. There’s no question of humanity involved, any more than there would be with three hungry tigers. Once they catch sight of us, either they kill us, or we kill them. They can go back aboard the boat if they will— but if so, they must set both those leaky boats adrift. I don’t think they’ll attempt to walk that reef or swim the lagoon— there are spots where they can’t pass the surf on the reef, and if they know anything about tropical lagoons, they’ll be afraid of poisonous sea-snakes.”

After a breakfast of roast pheasants that two of the Dutch passengers had managed to snare the day before, washed down with good hot coffee, the women were taken for an exploring trip to the other end of the island by Dr. Leyden and a Batavia man who could warn them what to avoid— while the rest of the men settled down to watch the poor old Van Joort in her marine graveyard.

About ten, a puff of smoke from the galley-pipe indicated that the pirates were cooking themselves a breakfast. In an hour they climbed to the upper deck with sea-glasses and examined everything they could see at that end of the island. They evidently had come to a decision while below, for they walked along to where the Number Two boat hung from her davits well aft and began casting off the lashings. When her bottom was just about touching the water of the lagoon, they slid down the falls, lowered her a foot more, cast off the falls and started to row across the lagoon. Even from the top of the cliff, the watchers could see the gleam of water spurting up through the holes in her metal— and it came in so fast that before reaching even the center of the lagoon they had to stop rowing and frantically commence bailing with a rusted tin pan and two caps. But they made no headway ; the water slowly gained upon them— before they could reach the beach it was certain that the boat would go down under them, and it seemed evident that all three were poor swimmers. Still they bailed, faster and faster, until they apparently were about exhausted.

Then— to the watchers’ horror— a wriggling dark-green thing about the size of a man’s thigh, with suckers on the lighter under-side, came over the gunwale of the boat and waved about until it curled around the second engineer’s neck and pulled him irresistibly into the water, breaking his grip on one of the thwarts as he slowly strangled. Two other snake-like arms came up and curled about the quartermaster’s body. As the boat was just about going under, O’Brien dived from its bow and came up facing a horrid massive sac with big goggling eyes which rose in front of him— and he felt great writhing tentacles constricting his own podlike belly— squeezing the breath out of him as a frightful beak approached his face.

TWO of the watchers on the cliff-brow suddenly retched and became vio¬ lently sick. Bremerton said slowly:

“Well— it wasn’t at all nice to look at! I’ll say it wasn’t! But it certainly re¬ moved the worst of our dangers. We know now what the tabu is on this lovely island. My gosh! No wonder the natives stuck up old What-d’ye-call-him at the foot of the rocks, and then beat it! I once saw an octopus at Ilo Ilo in the Philippines with tentacles sixteen feet long— never expected to see another that size as long as I lived. But those granddaddies down there who are breakfasting on our former shipmates have got that other one stung by a good five or six feet— measuring their tentacles by the length of that twenty-two-foot boat. Poor Bornje never had a chance when that horror caught him on the beach! I don’t know how far they can go out of water, but I’m fairly certain they wouldn’t get up to the top of these cliffs unless they had a big pool to plop into when they made it.”

Jarvis, the Englishman, said presently: “Really, you know— one cawn’t see that we’re so much better off even now, d’ye see. To be sure, our boats’ll not sink under us— an’ I fancy, with the axes Bremerton so thoughtfully fetched along, we’d manage to chop off some of those tentacles unless half a dozen of the brutes came at us at once. But there it is— we don’t know how many there are! It’s not too good— as a sportin’ proposition. Of course we’d prefer gettin’ aboard the old boat even if she is stuck fast on a reef— unlimited food, our own luggage, baths, tobacco an’ what not. But it’ll take a bit of doin’, you know— at that.”

Bremerton spoke up.

“I don’t believe the proposition is anything we can’t handle, Jarvis. Messy— and unpleasant— all that. But I’ve a sort of idea we might try it out when the women get back.”

By one o’clock the entire party were eating a luncheon under their projecting ledge on top of the cliff. The women were told that the pirates on the boat were dead and that menace removed, but no particulars were given, and nobody made any pretence of regrets which they somehow couldn’t feel. Lighting his pipe after the meal, Bremerton sat down on the very edge of the precipice and studied the lagoon below—the greaest depth of which appeared to be directly under him, with water so clear that he could make out patches of white sand or stone in depths which must have been a good ten or fifteen fathoms. Where the water was shallower, there were increasingly lighter shades of greens and browns. Where the almost vertical rays of the sun penetrated the depths and touched different rock-strata, there were iridescent and opaline reflections—large, small and brilliantly-colored fish being clearly revealed as they slowly drifted about as if floating in air.

In a few moments, he rolled a lump of rock weighing about forty pounds toard him, poising it upon the edge until he had it aimed in a certain direction, and then pushing it off with a vigorous shove. With the momentum gathered in a fall of eight hundred feet, it struck the water with terrific force and went to the bottom like a projectile from a naval gun. As soon as the ripples flattened out, an active movement of large dark masses could be seen in the depths, scurrying this way and that. In two or three minutes, the still wriggling mass of an enormous octopus floated to the surface, its sac-like body crushed to pulp where the stone had struck it.

AFTER another study of the lagoon, Bremerton called for a bit of co-operation in another experiment:

“We beached our boats at the edge of that lightest green patch over there. From here, it looks as if there isn’t more than a foot of water all along that light green— but there’s actually ten or more. O’Brien made the mistake of coming straight across the deep center from the boat— but by skirting the southern edge of the lagoon, we can keep in not more than six or eight feet of water all the way round. So what I want to test out is whether noises on the surface of the shallow part will attract those brutes from the depths, or not. Each of you get a pile of stones and heave them in— first, about where we landed— then as much farther as you can throw. Get the idea?”

They thought they did, and commenced the barrage. For a few minutes, nothing happened beyond sending all the fish streaking off to the other side; then, from four different points in the depths, scurrying shadows shot across into the lighter shades of green with almost incredible swiftness.

Anyone who has watched small octopi darting for a bit of food under water, either in an aquarium or shallow coastal waters, will have marveled at the amazing speed with which the creatures can propel themselves by sinuous movements of their wriggling arms through the water.

Reaching the places where the stones had fallen, the shadows darted from one spot to another, and occasionally lifted squirming arms above the surface— but none of them were sufficiently large to be a serious danger to anyone in a steamer’s boat, the tentacles being apparently not longer than six or eight feet, and four inches in diameter at the thickest part. They tried a second, third and fourth barrage— until finally the octopi gave it up in disgust and retired to deeper water.

More experiments were tried with rocks which it took three men to roll over the edge— in each case stirring up a commotion among vague and horrible shapes in the depths— bringing to the surface mangled remnants of another immense octopus.

By that time the New Yorker was satisfied that an attempt to get aboard the Van Joort would offer no serious risk, and asked the Chief and Nijhoff whether they were willing to chance it with him. As both had watched in horrified fascination the deaths of the pirates, they would much have preferred not trying it, but they couldn’t quite admit that an American had that much more nerve than had Dutchmen. They reached the trailing falls without mishap, hooked-on, and hauled the boat up to the davits. Then Bremerton said:

“I guess the most important job is to get all the folks aboard this old wreck before sunset, so they’ll have a good night’s rest with some feeling of security. Er— Wooermans! Most engineers carry with them, aboard, a few sticks of dynamite and a detonator, for blasting sand or rocks in case they get aground. Got any in your motor-room ?”

“In t’e storage-lockers— ja, plenty! Plenty wire too, I t’ink.”

“Good! Half a dozen sticks should be enough. Bring ’em along to the turtle-deck, aft, with the detonator and three hundred feet of double rubber-insulated wire for under-water use— and some sort of water-tight bag to hold the sticks.”

WHEN the Chief had done this, they made the wire-connection, sealed up the dynamite-sticks in a rubber bag with tape and rubber-cement. Whirling it around his head several times, Bremerton let go, the bag shooting upward and outward, taking the wire with it off the coil— until it dropped into the lagoon nearly over the center of the deepest part. Giving it time to sink, the Chief pushed the plunger of the detonator. In three seconds the reef and all that end of the island trembled violently; a fountain of water filled with fish and fragments of various marine creatures roared up a hundred feet into the air.

For the next two hours dead fish, dead sea-snakes, dead lobsters and fragments of all sorts floated up and lay upon the surface of the lagoon, where it took the tides of three days to carry them out through the reef-openings— providing a feast for sharks which came from every direction. Before sunset all the party were once more aboard the old Van Joort; and all the women except the impossible three volunteered as cooks for a celebration-dinner.

BREMERTON found Wooermans and took him up to the radio-shack with Joyce. Here he said:

“As I understand it, Chief, you acted as electrician— no regular wireless-man aboard? Vanderberg stood watch when he could, in the wireless-room, and Cap’n Tietjen put in a few hours each day. What runs the radio-generator?”

“Small engine in t’e motor-room— separate, you understandt.”

“How long will it take you to give me current? Aerials seemed all right after I overhauled the connections.”

“If not’ing wass smashed pelow, I gif you current in fifteen minutes— five kilowatt output from antenna, if you like. T’e set wass best short-wave outfit made in Amsterdam— he work up to range of t’ree t’ousand mile’ on one kilowatt if atmospherics wass goodt.”

“Give me two kilowatts to make sure.”

Joyce was speculatively studying his fellow New Yorker’s face.

“I say, old chap! Do you happen by any chance to be the ‘Bremerton’ of  General Minerals? Funny that hasn’t occurred to me since we met on board! Where’s your yacht?”

“Being overhauled at Kowloon. My sister’s cruising in her with friends of ours. Hmph! .... Come to think of it, you’re Joyce of General Aircraft— aren’t you? I rather suspected it.”

For an hour Bremerton sat there with his hand on the key— calling the letters of his deep-sea yacht in Hongkong harbor— getting occasional chat from other boats and stations— until finally his own operator acknowledged, took down memoranda of their exact position— and estimated that Miss Bremerton would have the yacht at the island in four or five days at the outside. Nothing was said about the wreck.

Hunting up Nijhoff, they went below to the purser’s office, where he unbolted a section of the ventilator which went up through his room from the hold, and hauled up a wire, at the end of which was a large package containing the jewels and bank-notes taken from the specie vault. O’Brien had blown out the locks, only to find it empty. At Bremerton’s suggestion, the purser returned each lot to its former owner, took a detailed receipt— and refused to assume any further responsibility for it.

Late that evening the Americans invited Dr. Leyden to Bremerton’s suite.

After some desultory chat, Bremerton remarked:

“Do you know, gentlemen— I rather hate to leave this place! Like some of the other small islands in the Dutch Indies, it’s one of the most beautiful spots on the surface of the globe— I could live here month after month, with perhaps an occasional short trip to the outer world, and be perfectly content. As a business proposition, it’s a lot better than even the Batavia Government seems to think. Near as I can figure it, this whole island chain east of Java is more or less volcanic, and the coral bugs have appropriated submarine ledges that looked good to them as foundations— saved ’em a lot of trouble— which, I suppose, is the ‘how-come’ of the coral-volcanic combination. Anyhow, the island is fairly rotten with some of the most valuable ores! And the Doctor, here, has already found some thirty rare medicinal plants which can be grown in quantity. The mysterious de¬ mon of the island is out of business— I doubt if there will be another big octopus in this lagoon for years. What do you suppose the Dutch Government would ask for the island, Doctor?”

THE botanist grinned shrewdly. “Well— if you wass asking t’em, t’ey put up t’e price on you— possibly not sell at all. You wass too well known in financhal circles. But if I wass puy him for botanic investigation— vell, perhaps hundred or hundred fifty t’ousand guilders. She wass tabu— t’ey cannot get any natif lapor on her.”

“Hmph! Buy her, will you! Come into a little syndicate with us— Joyce and I will put up half a million if we have to. You put in what you like. Eh? Mebbe we’ll end our days here— couldn’t find a lovelier spot! ”

And that’s the end of the story.

The other four boats? Nothing more was heard of them. Supposed to have been sent to the bottom by the second typhoon

____________________

Sub-titled "A Chapter of a Detective's Memoirs", this novelette does not feature any of Gaboriau's series characters. It was published in French in 1868, and exists in an anonymous English translation dating from the 1870s. Some English reprints of the story omit the introductory material, thinking perhaps that it is editorial rather than author's work, but the introductory material is all part of the story. One English edition I have read shows signs of other changes, including omitting all the diacritical letters: for example, Mechinet rather than the original Méchinet.

12: The Little Old Man of Batignolles

Émile Gaboriau

(1832-1873)

SOME YEARS AGO a man dressed in black, and apparently in the prime of life, presented himself at the office of the popular Parisian newspaper, Le Petit Journal, bringing with him a manuscript of such exquisite penmanship that even Brard, the prince of caligraphic artists, would have deemed it worthy of his talent.

'I will call again in a fortnight,' said the stranger, 'to know what you think of my work.'

The manuscript, like many and many of its predecessors, was at once stored away in a box labelled, 'MS to be read,' without the editor, the reader, or any of the staff evincing the least curiosity concerning its contents. Time passed by, and its author failed to return; but at last the reader was in duty bound compelled to glance through the box's contents, and one day, strange to relate, he burst into the office with a beaming face. 'I have just read something most extraordinary,' said he; 'the manuscript which that strange-looking fellow in black left with us, and without joking it is really a clever performance.' Now the readers attached to publishing firms or newspaper offices are not as a rule enthusiastic beings: rather the reverse, for they spend their lives wading through pages and pages of trash, and penning the laconic mention, 'Declined with thanks' on the margin of amateur copy. Thus when the reader of the Petit Journal expressed such a high opinion of the manuscript in question a general expression of surprise escaped the various regular contributors who were present. But with unabated fervour he cut all controversy short by throwing the manuscript on the table, and exclaiming: 'You doubt me, gendemen? Well read it yourselves.'

This sufficed to kindle curiosity. One of the writers on the paper immediately put the MS in his pocket, and when by the end of the week it had made the round of the staff, there was but one opinion: 'The Petit Journal must publish it.'

At this point, however, an unforeseen difficulty arose. The manuscript bore no author's name. The man in black had merely left it with a card, on which was inscribed, 'J. B. Casimir Godeuil,' without any address. What was to be done? Was the MS to be published anonymously? That was scarcely practicable at an epoch when the French press laws required each printed line to be signed by a responsible person. Besides was it certain that M J. B. Casimir Godeuil was the author? Might he not have presented the manuscript on a friend's behalf? To decide this point the only course was to find him, and inquiries were forthwith instituted in all directions, but unfortunately without result. No one had seemingly ever heard of such a being as J. B. Casimir Godeuil.

Then it was, that all Paris was placarded with gigantic bills asking for information concerning M. Godeuil's whereabouts. The walls of Lyons, Marseilles, and other large cities were similarly posted, and during a whole week folks asked themselves 'Who can this man Godeuil be?' Several opined that he was some prodigal son, whose return to the parental roof was anxiously hoped for; others suggested that he must be the lost heir to some princely fortune; whilst others again surmised that he might be a dishonest cashier, who had absconded with the contents of his employer's strong box. But, in the meanwhile, the manager of the Petit Journal had attained his object. Scarcely were the first bills posted when M J. B. Casimir Godeuil hastened in person to the office of the paper and made all necessary arrangements for the publication of his narrative, The Little Old Man of Batignolles, which constituted, he said, the first part of his memoirs. He, moreover, promised to bring other fragments of his autobiography, but in this respect he failed to keep his word, and all subsequent efforts to find him again proved unsuccessful. The following narrative (complete in itself), is therefore his only published work, but with the view of throwing some light on the author's character and object we have decided to print the subjoined preface, written by himself, and which was to have served for the whole series of his memoirs.

Preface

A PRISONER had just been brought before an investigating magistrate, and despite his denials, his stratagems and an alleged alibi it had been shown that he was guilty both of forgery and theft. Conquered by the evidence I had collected against him, he confessed his crimes, exclaiming: 'Ah!If I had only known the true power of the police and how difficult it is to escape its search, I should have remained an honest man.'

These words inspired me with the idea of writing my memoirs. Was it not advisable that every one should be made acquainted with the true state of affairs? Would not my revelations have a beneficial effect? Might I not strip crime of the poetry of romance and shew it as it really is: cowaidly and ignoble, abject and repulsive? Would it not be useful to prove that the most wretched beings in the world, are the madmen who declare war against society? And that is what I propose doing. I will prove that everyone has an immediate, positive, mathematical interest in remaining honest— I will show that, with our social organisation, with the railroad and the electric telegraph, impunity is virtually impossible. Punishment may be deferred, but it always comes at last. And profiting by what I write, many misguided beings may reflect before allowing themselves to slide along the road of crime. Many, whom the faint murmurings of conscience would have failed to influence, may be arrested in their course by the voice of fear.

Need I speak of the nature of these memoirs? They will describe the struggles, efforts, defeats, and victories of the few devoted men to whom the security of the Parisians is virtually entrusted. To cope with all the criminals of a city, which, with its suburbs, numbers more than three millions of inhabitants, there are but two hundred detectives at the disposal of the Prefecture of Police. It is to them that I dedicate this narrative.

i

WHEN I was completing my studies, in hopes of one day becoming a medical man— it was in the good old times when I was but three and twenty— I lived in the Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, almost at the corner of the Rue Racine. For thirty francs a month, service included, I rented a furnished room, which would cost more than three times as much nowadays, a room of such vast proportions that I was really able to stretch out my arms when putting on my coat, without having to open the window. I rose early and I went home late; for in the morning I had my hospital to 'walk,' and at night-time the Café Leroy possessed a seductive attraction which I was powerless to resist. Thus, it happened, that with one exception, the other dwellers in the house— mostly quiet people, living either by trade or on their incomes— were scarcely known to me, even by sight. The person I have excepted from the others was a man of medium height, with a clean-shaven face, and commonplace features, whom every one always deferentially called 'Monsieur' Méchinet. The doorkeeper treated him with the most profound respect, and invariably took off his cap whenever he perceived him. M. Méchinet lived on the same floor as myself; in fact his door was just opposite mine, and on several occasions we had encountered each other on the landing. As a matter of course, we bowed to one another, whenever this happened, but for some time our acquaintance was confined to these rudimentary tokens of civility. One night, however, M. Méchinet knocked at my door to ask me to oblige him with a few lucifers; another night I borrowed some tobacco from him, and one morning we happened to leave the house at the same time and walked together down the street exchanging the usual commonplace remarks about the weather. Such was the commencement of our connection.

Although I was neither inquisitive nor suspicious— a man is seldom so at three and twenty— I nevertheless liked to know what sort of people I had to deal with, and without prying into my neighbour's life I naturally asked myself: 'Who is he? What is his profession?' I knew that he was married, and, to all appearances, worshipped by his wife, a plump little body with fair hair and a smiling face; and yet it seemed to me that he was a man of most irregular habits, for he would frequently leave the house before daybreak, and I often heard him come home during the small hours of the morning, after being out all night. Moreover, every now and then he would absent himself for weeks at a time— and I could not understand how pretty little Madame Méchinet could put up with such strange behaviour, and indeed show herself so loving towards a husband of such a roaming disposition. In my perplexity I bethought myself of the doorkeeper, who, under ordinary circumstances, was as garrulous as a magpie, and who, I conjectured, would readily give me the information I desired. But I made a great mistake— for scarcely had I mentioned the name of Méchinet to him, than he sent me about my business in fine style, fiercely rolling his eyes and indignantly declaring that he was not in the habit of 'spying' on the tenants of the house. This unwonted reception on the doorkeeper's part so fanned my curiosity, that dismissing all restraint I began to watch my neighbour in earnest.

I soon made certain discoveries which seemed to me of a most ominous character. One day I saw him come home dressed in the latest fashion, with the ribbon of the Legion of Honour displayed in his button-hole, and a couple of mornings later I met him on the stairs wearing a dirty blouse and a ragged cap, which gave him a most villainous appearance. And this was not everything, for one afternoon, just as he was going out, I perceived his wife take leave of him on the landing and kiss him with passionate fondness, exclaiming: 'Take care, my dear, be prudent, think of your little wife at home.' 'Be prudent,' indeed!Why was he to be prudent? What did this all mean? Was the wife the husband's accomplice in all these strange goings on? After this incident I was fairly stupefied, but there was even yet more to come.

One night I was in bed, asleep and dreaming. Fancy had carried me back to the Café Leroy, which I had left a few hours previously, and I was apparendy absorbed in watching a most interesting game of billiards. The ivory balls sped right and left over the green baize, now striking the bands, and now cannoning with wonderful precision and effect. One thing surprised me, that whenever they came into contact there was a loud report, and at last, indeed, there was such a constant succession of cannons and clashes that I fairly started and woke up. The problem was instantaneously explained to me. What I had taken for the clashing of the billiard balls was a loud and repeated rat-tat-tat outside my room. I immediately sprang out of bed to ascertain what was the matter, and, to my surprise, as soon as I had opened the door, who should rush in but my mysterious neighbour, Méchinet, with his clothes in tatters, his shirt-front torn apart, but a wisp of his necktie left him, his head bare, and, to complete the picture, his face besmeared with blood. 'Good heavens!' cried I, in affright, 'what has happened?'

'Speak lower! you might be heard,' rejoined my neighbour with an imperious wave of the hand. 'This wound of mine in the face may be nothing after all, but it smarts terribly, and I thought you might be able to dress it, as you are a medical student.'

Without another word I made him sit down, and examined the wound he spoke of. As he had surmised, it was not serious, although it bled profusely. In point of fact, the skin of his left cheek was grazed from ear to mouth, and at different points the flesh was bare. As soon as I had washed the cheek and dressed it, M. Méchinet warmly tendered me his acknowledgments.

'Well, I've escaped without much harm after all,' said he. 'Many thanks, M Godeuil, I'm gready obliged to you. Pray don't mention this... little accident... to anyone. Forgive me for disturbing you, and now, goodnight!'

Goodnight, indeed! As if I could sleep in peace after such an adventure. My mind was haunted with all manner of strange ideas. It was plain enough now that this man Méchinet must be a highway robber or a burglar, possibly a cut-throat, and, at all events, a villain of the deepest dye. However, he quietly called on me the next day, thanked me over again, and, to my surprise, wound up by inviting me to dinner. Such courteous behaviour was scarcely in keeping with the character I had assigned to him, and more puzzled than ever I decided to accept his invitation, hoping that it might lead to some explanation of the mystery. I was, indeed, all eyes and ears on entering my neighbour's lodgings; but, despite the most minute scrutiny and patient attention, I neither saw nor heard anything at all of a nature to enlighten me.

Still, it happened that after this dinner our acquaintance considerably improved. M. Méchinet seemed anxious to cultivate my friendship. Every now and then he would invite me to take 'pot luck' with himself and his wife, and nearly every afternoon, during 'the hour of absinthe,' he would join me at the Café Leroy, where we habitually indulged in a game of dominoes pending dinner-time. One afternoon, in the month of July, between five and six o'clock, while we were thus engaged at the cafe, an ill-clad, suspicious-looking individual hurried in and, approaching my neighbour, whispered something, which I failed to master, in his ear. M. Méchinet immediately sprang to his feet with a pale face.

'I'm coming!' said he. 'Run and tell them I'm coming;' whereupon the messenger started off as fast as his legs could carry him. Then, turning to me and holding out his hand, my neighbour remarked: 'Please excuse me, M Godeuil, but duty before everything, you know; I must leave now, but we will resume our game tomorrow.'

All aglow with curiosity, and particularly struck by his air of excitement, I could not conceal the vexation his abrupt departure caused me; and still actuated by anxiety to penetrate the seeming mystery, I made so bold as to say that I felt sorry I was not to accompany him.

'Eh?' he retorted; 'well, after all, why not? Will you come? It may be interesting?'

I was too delighted and impatient to waste time in exchanging superfluous words, so that my only answer was to put on my hat and follow him out of the café.

ii

IN ACCOMPANYING M. Méchinet, I was certainly far from thinking that such a simple act would have a most decisive influence on my own after-life. 'Well, now, I shall know what this all means,' I murmured to myself, as puffed up with puerile satisfaction I trotted down the Rue Racine in my neighbour's wake. I use the word 'trotted' advisedly, for in truth I had great difficulty in keeping pace with my companion, who rushed on, pushing the passers-by out of his way with a strange air of authority, and making such rapid strides that one might have imagined his fortune depended on his legs.

Just as we reached the Place de l'Odeon, an empty cab drove by.

'Eh, cabman, stop!' cried M. Méchinet, and opening one of the doors he bade me get into the vehicle. 'Drive as fast as you can to 39 Rue de Lécluse, at Batignolles,' he added, speaking to the Jehu, and then with a bound he reached my side. The distance made the driver swear, but cutting his thin horse with a vigorous stroke of the whip he turned him in the right direction, and we rolled off, down towards the Seine.

'Ah! so we are going to Batignolles,' said I, in my most winning manner— that is, with courtly deference and just an interrogative touch in my tone. But, to my disappointment, M. Méchinet did not answer me, and indeed, I fancy that he did not hear my remark.

A strange change had come over his demeanour. He was not precisely excited, but his pursed lips and knitted brows showed that he was greatly preoccupied. His glance, lost in space, seemed to indicate that he was studying some mysterious, intricate problem. He had drawn a snuff-box from his pocket, and incessantly drew forth enormous pinches, which, after rolling between his forefinger and his thumb, he carried to his nose— without inhaling them, however. This was one of his little private manias which I had previously observed, and which gready amused me. The worthy man held snuff in horror, and yet he was always provided with a huge, meretriciously adorned snuff-box, such as players use when enacting a farce upon the stage. If anything unforeseen happened to him, were it either agreeable or afflictive, he invariably drew this monster snuff-box from his pocket, and pretended to regale himself with a vast number of pinches. Later on, I learnt that the subterfuge formed part of a system he had invented with the view of concealing his impressions and diverting the attention of folks around him.

In the meanwhile, we were rolling on. The cab climbed the precipitous Rue de Clichy, crossed the outer boulevard, turned into the Rue de Lécluse, and drew up a short distance from the number that had been given to the driver. It was materially impossible to go any further, for the street was crammed with a compact crowd. In front of No. 39, two or three hundred persons were standing with extended necks, gaping mouths, and inquisitive eyes. Their curiosity was so keen that they utterly disregarded the authoritative injunctions of half a dozen sergents de ville who, as they passed to and fro, kept on repeating: 'Move on!move on!'

Alighting from the vehicle, we approached the house, elbowing our way through the crowd, and we were but a few steps from the door of No. 39, when one of the sergents de ville roughly bade us draw back.

My companion took in the man's measure from head to foot at a single glance, and drawing himself up to his full height, exclaimed: 'Don't you know me? I aM. Méchinet, and this young man (pointing to myself) is with me.'

'Oh, pray excuse me, sir,' stammered the sergent de ville, saluting us with military precision. 'I did not recognise you— I was not aware— but please walk in.'

We crossed the threshold. In the hall a stalwart, middle-aged woman, with a face as red as a poppy, was perorating and gesticulating in the midst of a group of tenants belonging to the house. She was evidently the concierge or doorkeeper.

'Where is it?' roughly asked M. Méchinet, cutting her recital short.

'On the third floor, sir,' she replied; 'on the third floor— the door on the right hand. Oh Lord! what a misfortune! In a house like ours! And such a worthy man, too!'

I did not hear any more, for M. Méchinet had already sprung towards the staircase, up which I followed him, climbing four stairs at a time, and with my heart palpitating as if I were about to lose my breath. On the third landing, the door on the right hand side was open. We went in, crossed an ante-room, a dining-room, and a parlour, and finally reached a bed-chamber of ample size. Were I to live a thousand years, I should never forget the sight that met my eyes. At this moment even, I can still picture in my mind every particular of the scene.

Two men were leaning against the mantelpiece in front of the door. One of them, whose frock-coat was begirded with a tricolour sash, was a commissary of police; the other, an investigating magistrate. A young man, plainly the latter's clerk, was seated writing at a table on the left hand side; while on the floor in the centre of the room, lay a lifeless body— the body of a little, white-haired, old man, who was stretched on his back, with extended arms, in the midst of a pool of black, coagulated blood.

In my terror, I remained rooted on the threshold— so overcome, indeed, that to avoid falling I had to lean for support against the framework of the door. And yet, like every man of my profession, I was already familiar with death. I was accustomed to all the sickening sights which are every-day occurrences in an hospital or a medical school, but then, this was the first time that I found myself face to face with crime. For it was evident that an atrocious crime had been committed.

Less impressed than myself, my neighbour entered the room with a firm step.

'Ah, it's you, Méchinet,' said the commissary of police. 'I am sorry I sent for you.'

'And why, pray?' asked my neighbour.

'Because we shan't need to appeal to your skill. We know the culprit, I have given the necessary orders, and he must be arrested by now.'

Singularly enough, it looked as if this news sadly disappointed M. Méchinet . He drew out his snuff-box, pretended to take two or three pinches, and exclaimed:

'Ah, you know the culprit!'

It was the investigating magistrate who replied: 'Yes, know him certainly and positively,' said he. 'When the crime was accomplished the murderer fled, believing that his victim had ceased to live. But Providence was watching.... The poor old man still breathed. Summoning all his energy he dipped a finger in the blood that was flowing from his wound, and there on the floor he traced his murderer's name, thus handing him over to human justice.... However, look for yourself.'

On hearing this I immediately glanced at the floor, on one of the oall boards of which the letters MONIS were traced in blood, in rough but legible fashion.

'Well?' asked M. Méchinet, laconically.

'Well,' replied the commissary of police; 'those letters form the first two syllables of the name of Monistrol, which is that of the murdered man's nephew— a nephew of whom he was very fond.'

'The d——l,' ejaculated my neighbour.

'I don't fancy,' resumed the investigating magistrate; 'I don't fancy that the scoundrel will attempt to deny his guilt. Those five letters are terrible proof against him. And besides, he is the only man who could benefit by such a cowardly crime. He is the sole heir of this poor old fellow, who leaves, I am told, considerable wealth behind him. Moreover, the murder was committed last night, and the only person who visited the victrim was his nephew Monistrol, who, according to the concierge, arrived at nine o'clock. and did not leave until nearly midnight.'

'It's clear, then,' replied M. Méchinet, 'as clear as daylight. That fellow Monistrol is a perfect fool.' And, shrugging his shoulders, he asked: 'Did he steal anything— did he force open any article of furniture to mislead one as to the motive of the crime?'

'Up to the present,' replied the commissary, 'we have not noticed anything out of order. As you say, the scoundrel is not particularly ingenious. As soon as he is arrested, he will n o doubt confess.'

Thereupon he drew M. Méchinet to the window, and spoke to him in a low voice; while the magistrate turned to give some orders to his clerk.

iii

SO FAR AS M. Méchinet was concerned, my curiosity was satisfied. I had wished to know my enigmatical neighbour's profession, and now I knew it. He was simply a detective. Thus, all the incidents of his seemingly erratic life were explained— his frequent absence from home, his tardy return at night-time, his frequent change of costume, his sudden disappearances, his wife's fears and complicity, and even the wound I had dressed. But all this was of little moment now. I was far less interested in M. Méchinet than in the spectacle offered to my view. I had gradually recovered both my firmness and the faculty of reflecting; and I examined everything around me with eager curiosity. Standing beside the door, my glance took in the whole room. When scenes of murder are portrayed in illustrated periodicals they are usually invested with an exaggerated aspect of disorder. But such was far from being the case in the present instance. Everything testified to the victim's easy circumstances and habits of order and relative parsimony. Everything was in its place. The bed and the window curtains were faultlessly draped; and the woodwork of the furniture was bright with polish— proof of daily care. It appeared evident that the conjectures of the commissary and the magistrate were correct, and that the old man had been murdered the night before, just as he was going to retire to rest. In proof of this the bed was turned down, and a night-shirt and a night-cap were spread out open on the counterpane. On the little table at the head of the bed I perceived a glass of sugared water, a box of lucifers, and an evening newspaper— the Patrie. On the corner of the mantelshelf shone a weighty copper candlestick, but the candle which had lighted the crime had burnt away. The murderer had plainly fled without blowing it out, and the top of the candlestick, from which hung a few fragments of wax, like pendanticicles, was gready soiled and blackened.

I noticed all these circumstances well nigh at the first glance. My eyes seemed to play the part of a photographic lens, and the scene of the murder fixed itself on my mind as on a prepared sheet of glass, with such precision, accuracy, and effect, that even to-day I could draw from memory the bedroom occupied by the Little Old Man of Batignolles, without forgetting any single object it contained— without omitting even the green-sealed cork, which I still seem to see, lying on the ground underneath the chair of the magistrate's clerk. I was not previously aware that I possessed this power of observation— this master faculty, so suddenly revealed to me, and on the spot I was too greatly excited to be able to analyse my sensations and impressions. Curiously enough, I was possessed of an unique, irresistible desire. I felt impelled, despite myself, towards the corpse extended in the middle of the room. At first I battled with my impulse, but it was stronger than all my other feelings; and, yielding to it at last, I approached the body. Had my presence been noticed? I do not think so. At all events, no attention was paid to me. M. Méchinet and the commissary were still talking beside the window; and the clerk was reading the minutes of the proceedings in an undertone to the magistrate. Everything, therefore, favoured my design, and besides, I was seized, as it were, with a kind of fever which made me insensible to what was going on. Under this influence, I was well nigh unconscious of the functionaries' presence, and, acting as if I were alone and free to do whatever I liked, I knelt down beside the corpse, to examine it closely and at my ease. Indeed, far from reflecting that the magistrate or the commissary might indignantly ask: 'What are you about?' I acted as composedly as if I were about to discharge some pre-assigned duty.

The unfortunate old man seemed to be from seventy to seventy-five years of age. He was short and very thin, but certainly very hale for his age, and constitutionally fined to become well nigh a centenarian. He still possessed a fair crop of curly hair of a yellowish white tinge, and his face was covered with grey bristles, as if he had not shaved for five or six days. They had sprung forth, however, since his demise, and it is indeed curious to note how rapidly, under certain circumstances, the beard grows immediately after death. I was not surprised by this, for I had observed many similar cases among the 'subjects' provided for the examination of us students in the hospital dissecting hall. What did surprise me was the expression of the old man's face. It was calm and, I might almost say, smiling. His lips were parted as if he had been on the point of making some friendly remark. Death must have overtaken him most suddenly and promptly, for his face to retain this good-natured look. Such was the first thought that presented itself to my mind. Ay, but then, how could one reconcile these conflicting circumstances— sudden death, and the tracing of those five letters MONIS on the floor? To trace these letters with his own blood would require a great effort on the part of a dying man. Only the hope of vengeance could lend the requisite energy for such a task. And how enraged this poor old fellow must have been to feel the grip of death upon him before he was able to finish writing his murderer's name!

Enraged? But no, for the face of the corpse seemed positively to smile at me, and this was all the more singular as the victim had been struck at the throat with a steel weapon, which had penetrated right through his neck. This weapon must have been a dagger, or perhaps one of those formidable double-edged Catalan knives, which are pointed as finely as a needle. In all my life I had never been a prey to such strange sensations. My temples beat with extraordinary violence, and I could feel my heart swelling and almost bursting with intensity of dilation. What was I about to discover?

Still under the influence of the same mysterious, irresistible impulse which annihilated my will, I took hold of the victim's frozen, rigid hands to examine them. The right hand was quite clean, unstained; but such was not the case with the left one, the forefinger of which was red with blood! What! had the old man traced that accusatory inscription with his left hand? Was it probable? Was it likely? No, a thousand times no! But then... A score of conflicting thoughts battled in my mind, and, seized as it were with vertigo, with haggard eyes and hair on end, as pale certainly as the corpse extended on the floor, I sprung to my feet, giving vent to a terrible cry:

'Great God!' My shriek must have resounded through the house. With one bound the magistrate and Michinet, the commissary and the clerk were by my side.

'What is the matter?' they asked, with eager excitement; 'What is the matter?'

I tried to answer, but emotion well nigh paralysed my tongue. All I could do was to point at the dead man's hands, and stammer: 'There, see there!' M. Méchinet immediately knelt down beside the corpse. He observed the same particulars as myself, and evidently shared my opinion, for, quickly rising to his feet again, he exclaimed: 'After all, it was not the old man who traced those letters.'

And then, as the magistrate and the commissary stared at him with gaping mouths, he showed them that the victim's left hand alone was stained with blood.

'And to think I didn't notice!' mourned the commissary, looking very much distressed.

'Ah, it's often like that,' retorted M. Méchinet, frantically pretending to inhale repeated pinches of snuff. 'The things that stare us in the face are frequently those that most easily escape our view.... However, the situation is now quite changed. As it is evident that the old man did not write those letters, they must have been traced by the man who killed him.'

'Quite so,' observed the commissary in an approving tone.

'Well,' continued my neighbour, 'it is plain enough that a murderer is not foolish enough to denounce himself by writing his own name beside his victim's corpse. We shall all agree on that point, and so you may draw your own conclusions.'

The investigating magistrate looked thoughtful.

'Yes,' he muttered; 'it's clear enough. We were deceived by appearances.... Monistrol is not guilty. But then, who can be the culprit? It will be your business to find him, M. Méchinet .'

The magistrate paused, for a police agent of subaltern rank was at tjiat moment entering the room.

'Your orders are executed, sir,' said the newcomer, addressing himself to the commissary; 'Monistrol has been arrested, and he is now under lock and key at the Depot. He has confessed everything.'

iv

THE NEWS created all the greater sensation as, by reason of my discovery, it was altogether unexpected. The magistrate and the commissary looked absolutely stupefied, and, for myself, I was overwhelmed. What, whilst we were busily seeking, by a mathematical course of reasoning, to establish Monistrol's innocence, he, on his side, had formally confessed his guilt! Was it possible?

M. Méchinet was the first to recover from this hard blow. He excitedly carried his fingers from his snuff-box to his nose at least a dozen times, and then, turning to the agent, roughly remarked: 'You've either been misled or else you are misleading us. There's no other alternative.'

'I swear to you, Monsieur Méchinet—' began the man.

'Don't swear, pray; but hold your tongue. Either you misunderstood what Monistrol said, or else you've flattered yourself with the hope of astonishing us by the news that the whole affair is explained.'

The police agent, who had hitherto been most respectful in his demeanour towards the detective, now evinced signs of revolt.

'Excuse me,' he said, 'but I'm neither a fool nor a liar, and I know what I say.'

The discussion seemed so likely to turn into a dispute that the magistrate thought it advisable to intervene.

'Calm yourself, M. Méchinet,' said he, 'and wait for information before pronouncing judgment.' And turning towards the agent, he added, 'Now, my good fellow, just tell us what you know, and explain what you have already said.'

Finding himself thus supported, the agent drew himself up, gave my neighbour a glance of withering irony, and then, with an air of no little self-conceit, began: 'You gentlemen instructed Inspector Goulard, my colleague, Poltin, and myself to arrest a party named Monistrol, a dealer in imitation jewellery, residing at No. 75 Rue Vivienne, and charged with the murder of his uncle here, at Batignolles.'

'Quite correct,' remarked the commissary, with an approving nod.

'Well, then,' continued the agent, 'we took a cab and drove to the Rue Vivienne. Monistrol was in a little room at the rear of his shop, and he was about to sit down to dinner with his wife— a woman of wonderful beauty, between five-and-twenty and thirty years of age. On perceiving us all three in a row, the husband at once asked us what we wanted, whereupon Inspector Goulard drew the warrant out of his pocket, and replied: "In the name of the law I arrest you." '

As the agent proceeded with his narrative, M. Méchinet turned and twisted with nervous impatience.

'Can't you come to the point?' he suddenly asked. But the agent took no notice of the interruption.

'I have arrested a good many fellows in my time,' said he, with unabated composure; 'but I never saw any one experience such a shock as this man Monistrol. "You must be joking," he said at last, "or else you make a mistake." "No," said Goulard; "we don't make mistakes." "Well then, why do you arrest me Goulard shrugged his shoulders. "Don't behave like a child," he said. "Come, what about your uncle? His body has been found, you know, and there are convincing proofs against you." Ah, the scamp. What a blow it was for him! He staggered and let himself fall on to a chair stammering some unintelligible reply, half the words of which remained in his throat. On seeing this, Goulard caught him by the collar of his coat, and said: 'Take my advice: the best thing you can do is to confess." Thereupon he looked at us in an idiotic manner, and replied: "Well, yes, I confess everything." '

'Well done, Goulard!' quoth the commissary, approvingly.

The agent triumphed. 'We were bent on getting the business over as soon as possible,' he said. 'We were instructed not to create a disturbance, and yet a lot of idlers had already collected in front of the shop. So Goulard caught hold of the prisoner by the arm, and said: "Let's be off; they are waiting for us at the Prefecture." Monistrol drew himself up as well as he could on his quaking legs, and, summoning all his courage, answered: "Yes, let us start." We thought the business finished after that, but we had reckoned without the wife. Up till then she had remained in her armchair as still as if she had fainted, and without saying a word. Indeed, she scarcely seemed to understand what was going on. But when she saw that we were really going to carry her husband off, she sprang forward like a lioness, and threw herself before the door. "You sha'n't pass," she cried. 'Pon my word she really looked superb. But Goulard has had to deal with many similar cases. "Come, come, my little woman," said he, "don't get angry. It wouldn't do any good." But instead of moving she clung to the framework of the door, vowing that her husband was innocent, and declaring that if he were taken to prison she would follow him. At one moment she threatened us, and called us all sorts of names, and then she began to beg and pray in her softest voice But when she perceived that nothing would prevent us from doing out duty, she let go of the door and threw her arms round her husband's neck, "Oh my poor, dear husband!" she gasped; "is it possible that you can be charged with such a crime? Tell these men that you are innocent."

'Her grief was so great that we all felt compassion for her, but Monistrol, to our surprise, was ruffian enough to push the poor little woman back, so violently indeed that she fell all of a heap in a corner of the room behind the shop... . Fortunately, that was the end of it. The woman had fainted, and we profited of the circumstance to pack the husband into the cab, which was waiting for us outside. He could scarcely stand, much less walk, and so we had literally to carry him into the vehicle. His dog— a snarling, black mongrel— wanted to jump in with us, and we had all the pains in,the world to get rid of the beast. On the way Goulard tried to revive the prisoner and induce him to talk, but we couldn't get him to say a word. It was only on reaching the Prefecture that he seemed to recover his wits. When he had been properly stowed away in one of the secret cells, he flung himself on his bed, repeating, "What have I done! Good God! What have I done?" On hearing this Goulard approached him, and for the second time, asked: "So you own that you are guilty?" Monistrol nodded his head affirmatively, and then said, in a gasping voice, "Pray leave me alone." We did so, after placing a superintendent outside the cell, in front of the grating, so as to be ready in case the prisoner tried to play any tricks with his own life. Goulard and Poltin remained at the Prefecture, and I came on here to report the arrest.'

'All that is very precise,' muttered the commissary; 'very precise indeed.'

Such was also the magistrate's opinion, for he murmured, 'How can any one doubt Monistrol's guilt after that?'

As for myself, I was astonished but not convinced, and I was about to open my mouth to raise an objection when M. Méchinet forestalled me.

'All that's very well,' said he, 'only if we admit that Monistrol is the murderer, we also have to admit that he wrote his own name there on the floor, and to my mind that's rather too strong to be believed!'

'Pooh!' rejoined the commissary, 'as the prisoner confesses, what is the use of troubling about a circumstance which will no doubt be explained in the course of the investigation?'

However, the detective's remark had rekindled the magistrate's perplexity. 'I shall go to the Prefecture at once,' he said, 'and question Monistrol this very night.'

Then, after requesting the commissary to stay and accomplish the remaining formalities, pending the arrival of the medical men who had been summoned for the post-mortem examination, he took his departure, followed by his clerk and the agent who had come to announce Monistrol's arrest.

'I only hope those doctors won't keep me waiting too long,' growled the commissary, who was thinking of his dinner; and he then began to discharge his duties by sealing up sundry drawers and cupboards which contained articles of value . Neither Méchinet nor myself answered him. My neighbour and I were standing in front of each other, evidently absorbed in the same train of thought.

'After all,' murmured the detective, 'after all, perhaps it was the old man who traced those letters.'

'With his left hand, then,' said I. 'Is it likely? And besides, the poor fellow must have died instantaneously.'

'Are you sure of that?'

'Well, judging by his wound, I would swear to it. But the doctors will soon be here, and they will tell you whether I'm right or wrong. Of course I am but a student, and they will be able to speak with more authority than myself.'

M. Méchinet was worrying his nose with spurious pinches of snuff in frantic style.

'Perhaps,' said he; 'perhaps there is a mystery underneath all this. It is a point to be examined. We must start the inquiry afresh. And after all, why not? Well, let us begin by questioning the doorkeeper.' With these words he hurried out on to the landing, and leaning over the bannister of the stairs, exclaimed, 'Eh! doorkeeper, doorkeeper, just come up here, please.'

v

PENDING the doorkeeper's appearance, M. Méchinet devoted his time to a rapid but sagacious examination of the scene of the crime. The outer door of the apartment particularly engaged his attention. The lock was intact and the key turned in either sense without the slightest difficulty. It was therefore scarcely likely that a stranger had forced his way into the old man's rooms by means of a picklock or a false key. Whilst the detective was thus occupied I returned into the bedroom to pick up the green-sealed bottle cork which I had noticed lying on the floor. I was prompted to do this by the new instinct so suddenly born within me. On the side of the sealing-wax a circular, winding hole, plainly produced by the tip of a corkscrew, was apparent, whilst at the other end, ruddy with the stain of wine, I noticed to my surprise a deep perforation, such as might be caused by the blade of a sharp, finely-pointed weapon. Instinctively suspecting that this discovery might have its importance, I showed the cork to M. Méchinet, who on perceiving it could not repress an exclamation of delight.

'Ah!' said he, 'at last we are on the scent. That cork was evidently left here by the murderer. He had pricked his weapon into it— either to prevent the point from wounding him whilst he carried it in his pocket, or to keep it sharp and prevent it from breaking. So the weapon was plainly a dagger with a fixed handle, and not one of those knives that shut up. With this cork I will undertake to find the murderer, no matter who he may be.'

The commissary of police was finishing the sealing-up of the cupboards in the bedroom, and M Mlchinet and I were still talking together in the parlour, when a sound of heavy breathing interrupted us. At the same moment, the portly, stalwart crone whom I had noticed in the hall perorating for the benefit of the tenants, appeared upon the threshold. Her face was ruddier than ever.

'What do you desire, sir?' she asked, looking at M. Méchinet .

'Please sit down,' he replied. 'But I have people waiting for me downstairs, sir.'

'They can wait. Just sit down.' M. Méchinet 's authoritative tone evidently impressed the old woman, and without more ado she obeyed him.

'I require certain information,' he began, fixing his piercing grey eyes on hers, 'and I am going to question you. In your interest I advise you to answer me frankly. As you are the doorkeeper of the house you can tell me the name of this unfortunate old man who has been murdered.'

'His name was Pigoreau, my good sir, but he was generally called Anténor, which was a name he formerly took in his business, as being better suited to it.'

'Had he lived long in this house?'

'For more than eight years, sir.'

'Where did he live before then?'

'In the Rue de Richelieu, where he had his shop, for he had been a hairdresser, and it was in that calling that he made his fortune.'

'So he was rich, then?'

'Well, I've heard his niece say that he wouldn't let his throat be cut for a million francs.'

The investigating magistrate was probably fully informed on this point, for during his sojourn in the house he had gone carefully through all the old man's papers.

'Now,' resumed M. Méchinet, "what kind of man was this M Pigoreau alias Anténor.'

'Oh, the best man in the world, my good sir,' replied the doorkeeper. 'He was a bit eccentric and obstinate, but he wasn't proud. And when he chose, he could be so funny! One might have spent nights and nights listening to him when he was in the humour to talk, for he knew so many stories. Just fancy, he had been a hairdresser, and, as he often said, he had curled the hair of all die most beautiful women in Paris.'

'How did he live?'

'Like other people— like a man living on his income, but not inclined to be prodigal.'

'Can't you give me any particulars?'

'To be sure I can, sir, for it was I who cleaned his rooms and waited on him. Ah! he didn't give me much trouble, for he did a great deal himself. He was always sweeping and dusting and polishing. That was his hobby! Every day, at twelve o'clock, I used to bring him up a cup of chocolate and a roll; and on the top of them he would drink off a big glass of water at one gulp. That was his breakfast. Then he dressed himself, and that took him till two o'clock, for he was very particular about his appearance, and arrayed himself every day just as if he were going ty be married. When he was dressed he went out, and strolled about Paris till six o'clock, when he used to go and dine at a table d'hôte, kept by Miles. Gomet in the Rue de la Paix. After dinner he usually went to the café Guerbois, took his cup of coffee, and played his game at cards with some friends he used to meet there. He generally came home at about eleven o'clock. He had only one fault, poor dear man : he was dreadfully fond of the fair sex, and I often used to say to him, "Come, Monsieur Anténor, aren't you ashamed to run after women at your age?" But then we are none of us perfect, and, after all, his behaviour wasn't surprising on the pan of a man who had been a fashionable hairdresser, and had met with so many favours in his time.'

An obsequious smile curved the portly crone's thick lips as she spoke on this point, but M. Méchinet remained as grave as ever.

'Did M Pigoreau receive many visitors?' he asked.

'Very few, sir. The person who came most frequendy was his nephew, M Monistrol, whom he used to invite to dine with him every Sunday at the restaurant of "Pire Lathuile?" '

'And on what terms were they— the uncle and the nephew?'

'Oh, they were as friendly as two fingers of the same hand.'

'And didn't they ever have any disputes together?' 'Never! .. . Excepting that they always used to disagree about Madame Clara.'

'Who is this Madame Clara?'

'Why, M Monistrol's wife, to be sure, and a superb creature she is, too! But with all his love for the sex, M Anténor couldn't put up with her. He used to tell his nephew that he loved his wife too much, that she led him by the nose, and deceived him just whenever she chose. He pretended that she didn't love her husband, that she had tastes above her position, and that she would end one day by doing something foolish. In fact, Madame Clara and M Anténor had quite a quarrel last year. She wanted the old man to lend M Monistrol a large sum, so that he might buy the "goodwill" of a jeweller's shop in the Palais Royal; but he refused to do so, and said he didn't care what was-done with his fortune when he was dead, but that in the meantime, having earned his money himself, he meant to keep it and spend it as he chose.'

I thought that M. Méchinet would insist on this point, which seemed to me of high importance, but to my surprise, and despite all the signs I made him, he did not do so.

'How was the crime discovered?' was his next question.

'Why, it was discovered by me, my good sir!' replied the doorkeeper. 'Ah! it was frightful! Just fancy, at noon today I came upstairs as usual with M Anténor's chocolate. As I waited on him, I had a key of his rooms. I opened the door, came in, and, Good Heavens! what a sight I saw!'

So saying, the buxom dame gave vent to a succession of unearthly whines and groans.

'Your grief shows that you have a kind heart,' observed M. Méchinet gravely. 'Only, as I am pressed for time, I must ask you to master it. Come, what did you think when you saw the old man lying there murdered?'

'Why, to be sure, I told everyone that his rascally nephew had killed him to get hold of his fortune!'

'How is it you were so certain on the point? For it is a grave matter to charge a man with such a crime— it's sending him to the scaffold, mind.'

'But who else could it be, sir? M Monistrol came to see his uncle yesterday evening, and when he went away it was almost midnight. I thought it strange that he didn't speak to me, even when he came or when he left, for he generally wishes me good-day and goodbye. However, after he went away last night, and until I discovered everything this morning, I'm quite sure that no one else came to see M Anténor.'

This evidence fairly stupefied me. I was young then and wanting in experience, and therefore thought it really superfluous to continue the investigation. But, on the other hand, M Michenet could boast of very extensive experience indeed, and he moreover possessed the art of coaxing the whole truth out of a witness, no matter however unwilling.

'So,' said he to the doorkeeper, 'you are quite certain that Monistrol came here last night?'

'Quite certain, sir.'

'Then you saw him, and recognised him?'

'Ah, allow me! I didn't look him in the face, for he passed by very fast, as if he wished to hide himself, the scoundrel! And besides, the stairs are badly lighted.'

I sprung from my chair on hearing this answer, which struck me as being of very great weight indeed, and, advancing towards the doorkeeper, I exclaimed,

'If that is the case how can you dare to pretend that you recognised M Monistrol?'

The portly dame looked at me from head to foot, and, with an ironical smile, replied, 'If I didn't see his face, at least I saw his dog, who was with him. I always treat the animal kindly, and so he came into my room, and I was just going to give him a leg of mutton bone, when his master whistled to him from upstairs.'

I looked at M. Méchinet to know what he thought of this answer, but his expression told no tales. He simply asked, 'What kind of a d'og is M Monistrol's?'

'He's a watch dog, sir— quite black, with just one white spot on the top of the head. M Monistrol calls him Pluto. He's generally very savage with strangers, but then he knows me well, for he has always been in the habit of coming here with his master, and besides, I've always been very kind to him.'

M. Méchinet now rose from his chair. 'That will do,' said he to the doorkeeper; 'you may retire. Thank you for your information.'

And as soon as the woman had bustled out of the room, he turned to me exclaiming, 'I really think that the nephew must be the guilty party.'

While the doorkeeper's interrogatory was progressing, the two medical men who had been instructed to perform a post-mortem examination of the old fellow's body, had arrived and set about their task in the bedroom. I was particularly anxious to know what would be the result of their report— the more so as, despite my own conclusions, I feared they might possibly disagree. They were certainly of very dissimilar appearance and character; for, while one of them was short and fat, with a round and jovial face, the other was lank and lean, with a grave and pompous expression of countenance. You could not look at them, indeed, without at once thinking of Moliere's immortal creations, 'Doctor Tant Pis' and 'Doctor Tant Mieux.' But, at times, extremes meet, and at least on this occasion this unmatched pair not merely met in being but in ideas and opinions as well. They both took absolutely the same view of the case, and I was delighted, as an amateur detective, and flattered, as a medical student, to find that their view exacdy coincided with mine. Indeed, their report resolved itself into this:

'The death of M Pigoreau was instantaneous. He expired directly the knife or dagger penetrated his neck, and consequently he could not possibly have traced those five letters MONIS, inscribed on the oak floor beside his body.'

Thus I had not been mistaken, and I turned with satisfaction towards M. Méchinet to hear what he would have to say now.

'Well, if the old man did not write those letters,' he remarked at last, 'who could have written them? Not Monistrol, I would take my oath to that. It would be altogether too incredible.'

I myself made no rejoinder, but the commissary of police, who was delighted to be able to go away to his dinner after such a long and tiring task, overheard the words, and could not resist the pleasure of taunting the detective for his perplexity and obstinacy, which, to his mind, were all the more ridiculous as Monistrol had confessed the crime.

'Ridiculous?' ejaculated M. Méchinet ; 'well, yes, perhaps I am only a fool! However, the future will decide that point.' And then, abruptly turning to me, he added: 'Come, M Godeuil, let us go together to the Prefecture of Police.'

vi

WE HAD neither of us dined, but this puzzling affair so absorbed our minds that we did not even think of feeling hungry. On reaching the street we walked as far as the outer boulevard where we engaged another cab to take us to the Prefecture. While the vehicle rolled on down the Rue de Clichy and along the Chaussee d'Antin, crossing the grand boulevards, already all ablaze with light, and cutting through numerous narrow thoroughfares in the direction of the Rue de Rivoli and the Quays, M. Méchinet 's fingers did not stop travelling from his empty snuff-box to his nose, and vice versa— so great indeed was his preoccupation. Over and over again, moreover, I heard him grumble between his teeth, 'I must find out the truth; I must, I will.'

All of a sudden he drew from his pocket the green-sealed cork which I had handed to him, and turned it over and over like a young monkey, who, in possession of a nut for the first time, asks himself how he is to get at the kernel.

'And yet,' he murmured, 'and yet that's a piece of evidence. That green sealing-wax must be made to tell us something.'

Comfortably ensconced in my corner, I listened to him without saying a word. My situation was certainly very singular, and yet I did not for one moment think of its peculiarity. My mind was entirely absorbed in this affair, the diverse contradictory elements of which I tried to classify in my brain, turning to one after the other in hopes that it would give me the key of the mystery which, to my idea, assuredly existed.

When our vehicle drew up on the Quai des Orfèvres all around was silent and deserted— not a sound, not a passer-by. The few shops of the neighbourhood were all closed, with but one solitary exception— a little tavern and eating-house, situated almost at the corner of the famous Rue de Jerusalem, so long associated with the repression of crime, and the name of which, synonymous, so to say, with the word 'police', suffices to chill the blood of the most hardened rogues. Against the red cumins of the tavern windows, which shone out in the dark night with a fiery glare, I noted the shadows of numerous customers— subordinate officials of the Prefecture, who had profited of a spare moment to come out and refresh themselves, and detectives, who, after a long day's arduous tramp and toil, were bent on restoring tired nature with a crust and a glass of wine.

As we walked by, M. Méchinet just gave a glance inside, more from habit than curiosity (for, like myself, he was in no mood to loiter), and then turned swiftly into the Rue de Jérusalem.

'Do you think they will let you see Monistrol?' I asked him, breaking once more into a trot so as to keep up with his rapid stride.

'Certainly they will,' he answered. 'Am I not entrusted with following up the affair? According to the phases of the investigation, I may require to see the prisoner at any hour of the day or night.'

And then turning under the dark-arched entrance of the Prefecture, he added, 'Come, come, we have no time to lose.'

I did not require encouragement. A strange, vague curiosity filled my mind as I followed in his wake. This was the first time in my life that I crossed the threshold of the Prefecture de Police, against which I had hitherto been quite as prejudiced as any other Parisian. Those who study social questions may well ask how it happens that the French police are so generally hated and despised. Even the ordinary street policemen, yclept the sergent de ville, is an object of aversion; and the detective, the mouchard is loathed as intensely as if he were some monstrous horror, in lieu of generally being a most useful servant of society. The deep-rooted prejudices that prevail among the Parisians in reference to the police are of distant origin, and are no doubt due to many causes; but the fault mainly rests with the successive governments which, turning the force from its original mission as a guarantee of public security, transformed it into a political instrument, utilising its services for the execution of the most arbitrary measures, and frequently placing it under the control of low-minded, immoral men. The unpopularity of Voyer d'Argenson duly fell on the 'exempt' of the ancien regime; and besides, the hateful Bastille and the odious lettre de cachet would alone have sufficed to make the police an object of aversion and terror in those times. Under the Empire and the Restoration the service could not possibly hope for rehabilitation, for was it not under the control of the arch-traitor Fouchi, as arrant a scoundrel as any of the criminals his subordinates were employed to track? And in the days of Vidocq, moreover, when the maxim 'set a thief to catch a thief was put into practice, and when the 'security' of the Parisians was entrusted to a band of knaves, all respect for the police became quite out of the question. Even when the force was thoroughly reorganised, the stain of former times clung to it persistently, and a new form of unpopularity awaited it when the Third Napoleon made the Prefecture the headquarters of his system of government. The ferocity displayed by many sergents de ville in days of popular turmoil, the hateful practices of the political mouchards, the invention of spurious plots and riots, 'got up' to terrify the provinces and justify acts of repression— all combined to throw odium on the force. It should be mentioned, however, that the Parisian in his aversion for the police often acts without discernment. He takes all the sergents de ville or gardiens de la paix to be of one and the same class and character, forgetting that it is mainly the Central Brigade that is employed on political duty.

This Central Brigade, indeed, does not perform ordinary strict service, but is always at the prefect's disposal to be dispatched to any part of the capital where occasion may require. To the 'Centrale' is assigned the sad privilege of charging the crowd, ill-treating inoffensive passers-by, and overturning women and children on days of popular effervescence. But the other brigades, to which are entrusted the protection of property and the safety of citizens, are composed of men of a very different stamp— men who behave reluctantly and with moderation when necessity compels them to assist the 'Centrale' in the performance of some political task; men whose main object and desire is to prevent the perpetration of crime and to bring evil-doers to book. But then, lucklessly for them, they wear the same uniform as their colleagues of the 'Centrale', and the Parisian confounds the whole force in his blind aversion. He blunders in the same way respecting the detectives— forgetting that there is the criminal service and the political service, and that the two are utterly distinct. To him, the mouchard is invariably an unprincipled, eavesdropping knave, who earns his living by prying into other people's secrets and denouncing them to his employers. He habitually pictures the detective as a man who slinks along the boulevard trying to overhear what the promenaders are talking about, or who lingers half asleep in the corner of a café bent on listening to the conversation of the customers. The mouchard, to his idea, is invariably the man who questions your doorkeeper, or concierge, concerning your antecedents, your trade or profession, your income, and your mode of living, and who, if your opinions are not perfectly orthodox, marks a cross against your name, signifying that you are to be watched and 'run in' as soon as an opportunity for political repression presents itself.

The Parisian does not realise, and yet he certainly should know it, that there are other detectives of a very different stamp— men like the great Monsieur Lecoq and the eminent Monsieur Méchinet, who in their whole career never do one day's political service, but, on the contrary, spend their lives constantly tracking crime and unravelling fraud— risking incredible dangers, often wounded, and at times even killed in the performance of their duty, and yet always ready and willing to undertake any task, however perilous, to ensure the safety of society and bring offenders to book. That these men, who truly Constitute the 'strong arm of the law', and thanks to whose energy and enterprise Parisian crime is so swiftly and certainly punished, should be confounded with the obnoxious, political mouchard, is an act of utter ingratitude and injustice; but then Paris, although priding itself on its common sense, is unfortunately too impulsive, too prejudiced, and too apt to draw sweeping conclusions, to perceive the difference— vast as it may be.

As I followed M. Méchinet that night into the headquarters of the criminal service, the main 'points' of this long but I think not useless digression flashed through my mind in a twentieth part of the time it has taken me to jot them down. I realised the folly of the prejudices I had shared with so many others, and as my neighbour walked on in front of me he seemed to grow in height, importance, and dignity. Here, then, was one of those men who devote themselves to the most arduous profession that can exist, and who, for the dangers they brave, and the services they render, only reap contumely and contempt. For what is their modest stipend? It barely suffices for their every-day wants, and does not permit of laying money by, so that a scanty pension, only acquired after long, long years of toil and peril, becomes their sole resource, in their old age.

I was so immersed in thought of this character, as my neighbour and I entered the Prefecture, that I forgot to look where I was walking, but a sudden stumble against a projecting angle of the pavement at last brought me back to reality.

'So, here is the secret of Paris!' I muttered, glancing at the damp blank walls of the passage we had entered, 'Ah, if those stones could only talk, what stories they would have to tell.'

At this moment, we reached a little room where a couple of men sat playing cards, whilst three or four others lounged on a camp bedstead, smoking their pipes. M. Méchinet went inside, and I waited on the threshold. He and one of the cardplayers exchanged a few words, which did not reach me, and then he came out again, and once more bade me follow him. After crossing a courtyard and hurrying down another passage, we found ourselves in front of a formidabl e iron gate, with massive close-fitting bars, weighty bolts, and a huge lock. At a word from M. Méchinet a keeper opened this gate, and then, leaving on our right hand a spacious guard-room, where a number of sergents de ville and gardes de Paris were assembled, we climbed a very precipitous flight of stairs. On the landing above, at the entry of a narrow passage lined with a number of little doors, we found a tall, fat, jovial-featured individual, who in no wise resembled the gaoler usually read of in novels.

'Hallo!' exclaimed this smilin g colossus. 'Why it's Monsieu Méchinet!' And with a self-satisfied chuckle he added, 'To say the truth I half expected you; come, I bet you want to see the fellow who has been arrested for murdering the little old man of Batignolles?'

'Quite so. Is there anything new, pray?'

'No, not that I know of.'

'But the investigating magistrate must have been here?'

'Oh, yes; in fact he only left a few minutes ago.'

'Ah!did you hear him say anything?'

'Well, he only remained two or three minutes with the prisoner, and he looked delighted when he left the cell. He met the governor at the bottom of the stairs, and I heard him say, "That fellow's account is as good as settled. He didn't even venture to deny his guilt." '

On hearing this, M. Méchinet almost bounded from the floor, but the gaoler seemingly failed to notice his surprise, calmly resuming, 'I wasn't particularly astonished when I heard that, for directly the fellow was brought to me, I said to myself, "Here's a chap who won't know how to plan a defence." '

'And what is he doing now, pray?'

'Well, he's lamenting— sobbing and crying as if he were a baby in long clothes. I was instructed to watch him, so as to prevent him from committing suicide, and as a matte of course, I perform my duty; but, between you and I, watching is quite useless, I've taken his measure properly enough. He's only crying because he's afraid of the guillotine. He's one of those chaps who are more anxious about their own skins, than about other persons.'

'Well, let's go and see him,' interrupted M. Méchinet . 'And above everything pray don't make a noise.'

Thereupon, we all three turned round and walked on tiptoe to a door hard by. At the height of a man's head, a barred aperture had been cut in the stout oak panelling, so that the interior of the cell, badly lighted by a single gas burner, could be viewed from the passage. The gaoler gave a glance inside. M. Méchinet did the same, and then my turn followed.

On a narrow iron bedstead, covered with a grey blanket with yellow stripes, I could perceive a man extended on his stomach, with his head buried in his hands. He was weeping, and his sobs were plainly audible. At times he quivered from head to foot with a kind of convulsive spasm; but otherwise he did not move.

'You may open the door now,' said M. Méchinet to the keeper, after a moment's pause. The man obeyed, and we all three walked into the cell.

On hearing the key grate in the lock, the prisoner had raised himself to a sitting position, and now, with drooping arms and legs, and with his head leaning on his chest, he looked at us as if either stupefied or idiotic. He was from five to eight and thirty years of age, rather above the medium height, with a broad chest, and a short apoplectic neck. He was not a handsome man; far from it, for he had been grievously disfigured by the smallpox, and, besides, his retreating forehead and long nose gave him altogether a simple, sheepish look. However, his blue eyes were very soft and winning, and his teeth were remarkably white and well set.

'What? Monsieur Monistrol,' began my neighbour on entering the cell. 'What! you are worrying yourself like that?' And he paused as if expecting a reply. But finding the unfortunate man speechless, he determined to tackle him in a different fashion.

'Come, come,' he accordingly resumed. 'I agree that the situation isn't very lively; and yet, if I were in your place, I should like to prove that I'm a man. I should try to curb my grief, and set about proving my innocence.'

'But I am not innocent,' answered the prisoner, in a savage tone.

This time equivocation was out of place. There was apparently no longer any room left for doubt, for it was from Monistrol's own lips that we obtained this terrible confession. And yet M. Méchinet seemed scarcely satisfied.

'What!' asked he, 'was it really you?'

'Yes, it was I,' interrupted the prisoner, springing to his feet with bloodshot eyes, and foaming mouth, as if he were seized with a sudden attack of madness. 'It was I— I alone. How many more times must I repeat it? Why only a little while ago, a judge came here and I confessed everything to him, and even signed my confession. What more do you want? Oh, I know what's in store for me, and pray don't fancy that I'm afraid! Having killed, I must be killed in my turn as well; so chop off my head, and the sooner you do it, the better!'

Although, at first, somewhat disconcerted by this violent outburst, M. Méchinet promptly recovered himself.

'Come, come,' said he. 'Wait a minute pray. People are not guillotined like that. First of all, they must be proved to be guilty. And then, justice takes due account of certain disorders of the mind, of certain sufferings and impulses— fatalities if you like— and it was indeed for that reason, that "extenuating circumstances" were invented.'

Monistrol's only reply was a long, low groan of mental agony. 'Now answer me,' resumed M. Méchinet . 'Did you really hate your uncle so much as all that?'

'Oh, no,' promptly answered the prisoner.

'Well, then, why did you kill him?'

'I wanted his fortune,' replied Monistrol in a panting voice. 'My business was going to rack and ruin. You may make enquiries on that point. I needed money; and although my uncle was very rich, he wouldn't assist me.'

'I understand,' rejoined M. Méchinet . 'And you hoped that you would escape detection?'

'Yes, I hoped so.'

At this point, I began to understand why my neighbour was conducting the interrogatory in this desultory fashion, which at first had so surprised me, and I guessed what kind of trap he was preparing for the prisoner. Indeed, the very next moment he curtly asked, 'By the way, where did you buy the revolver you shot your uncle with?'

I looked eagerly and anxiously at Monistrol, but he did not evince the least surprise.

'Oh, I had it by me for some years,' he replied. 'And what did you do with it, pray, after committing the crime?'

'I threw it away... on the outer boulevard.'

'Very good. I will have a search made, and no doubt we shall be able to find the person who must have picked it up.'

While M. Méchinet spoke in this fashion— deliberately lying in order to arrive at the truth— his features retained an expression of imperturbable gravity. 'What I can't understand,' added he, after a moment's pause, 'is that you should have taken your dog with you.'

'What! my dog!' ejaculated the prisoner, with an air of genuine surprise. 'Ay, your dog... Pluto... the doorkeeper recognised him.'

Monistrol clenched his fists, and his lips parted as if he were about to make some savage rejoinder, but at the same moment a new thought evidendy darted through his mind, and he flung himself once more on his bed, exclaiming, in a tone of resolution, 'That's enough torture; come, leave me to myself. At all events, I sha'n't answer any more.'

As he was plainly bent on keeping his word, M. Méchinet refrained from insisting, and we left the cell together. We went silently downstairs, and crossed the passages and courtyards of the Prefecture, without exchanging a remark. But when we reached the quay, I could control my thoughts no longer.

'Well, what do you think now?' I asked, catching my neighbour by the arm. 'You heard what that unfortunate fellow said. He pretends to be guilty, and yet he doesn't even know how his uncle was killed. That question about the revolver was a stroke of genius on your part. How readily he fell into the trap! After that, it's plain enough that he's innocent; for, otherwise, he would have told us that he did the deed with a dagger, and not with a revolver, as you pretended.'

'Perhaps so,' answered the detective, and then, with a sceptical air, he added, 'After all, who knows? I've met with so many actors in my time. But, at all events, that's enough for today. Let us go home. You must come and eat a mouthful at my place. Tomorrow, when it's daylight, we'll continue our inquiry.'

vii

IT WAS ten o'clock at night when M. Méchinet, still followed by myself, rung at the door of his lodgings.

'I never carry a key,' he said to me, 'for in our cursed trade no one knows what may happen. There are so many scoundrels who owe me a grudge, and besides, if I am not always prudent as concerns myself, I must be so for my wife.' My neighbour's explanation was superfluous, for I fully realised the dangers to which he must be exposed. And moreover, wnen I was previously watching him with the view of penetrating the secret of his seemingly mysterious life, I had already noticed that he rung at his door in a peculiar manner, evidently preconcerted between his wife and himself.

The bell was answered by pretty Madame Méchinet in person. With feline agility and grace, she flung her arms round her husband's gavf him a pair of passionate kisses, and gaily exclaimed, 'Ah, so here you are at last! I don't know why, but I almost felt uneasy....'

But all of a sudden she paused, her bright smile died away, her brow lowered, and, loosening her hold around her husband's neck, she drew several paces back. The fact is, that she had just caught sight of me, standing close by, on the threshold. That Monsieur Méchinet and myself should return together at the same time— and so late at night— seemed to her a most suspicious circumstance.

'What! have you only just left the café?' she asked, speaking as much to me as to her husband. 'You have been there up till ten o'clock at night? Really, that's too bad!...'

I turned to my neighbour for his reply. An indulgent smile flickered on his lips, and his attitude was that of a man who, confident in his wife's trustfulness, knows that he need only say one word to quiet her ruffled mind.

'Don't be angry with us, Caroline,' he exclaimed, thus associating me with his own cause. 'We left the café hours ago, and we haven't been wasting our time. The fact is, I was fetched away on business— for a murder committed at Batignolles.'

On hearing this, Madame Méchinet glanced suspiciously at both of us, and then, seemingly convinced that she was not being deceived, she curtly ejaculated, 'Ah!' The exclamation was brief enough, and yet it was full of meaning. It was evidently addressed to her husband, and signified, 'So you have confided in that young man? You have made him acquainted with your profession, and you have revealed our secrets to him?'

At least, that is how I understood the word, and my neighbour plainly construed its meaning in the same style, for he impetuously answered, 'Well, yes, M Godeuil has been with me this evening. And pray, where's the harm? If I have to fear the scoundrels whom I've handed up to justice, what need I fear from honest folks? Do you think, my dear, that I hide myself— that I am ashamed of my profession?'

'You misunderstood me, dear,' objected Madame Méchinet. But her husband did not even hear her. He had already sprung on to his favourite hobby, and, once astride, he was not easily persuaded to dismount. 'Now, really,' said he, 'you have most singular ideas, my love. What! Here am I, a sentinel at the advanced posts of civilisation. I sacrifice my peace of mind, and risk all my life to ensure the safety of society, and yet you think I ought to blush for my profession!It would be altogether too comical. You may tell me that there are a lot of foolish prejudices abroad respecting the police. No doubt there are, but what do I care for them?Oh! I know that there are a number of susceptible folks who pretend to look down on us. But, sacre bleu, I should like to see their faces, if my colleagues and myself were only to go on strike for a single day, leaving Paris at the mercy of the legion of scoundrels whom we keep in respect.'

Madame Méchinet was no doubt accustomed to outbursts of this kind, for she did not answer a word; and indeed she acted wisely, for as soon as my neighbour perceived that there was no prospect of his being contradicted, he calmed down with surprising promptness.

'Well, that'll do,' said he; 'just now we have a more pressing matter to deal with. We have neither of us dined, we are dying of hunger, and we should be glad to know if you have anything to give us to eat.'

Plainly enough, Madame Méchinet often had to cope with similar emergencies, for, with a pleasant smile, she readily answered, 'You shall be served in five minutes.'

And in fact, a moment later we were seated at table before a succulent joint of cold beef; while my neighbour's wife filled our glasses with one of those bright-coloured, refreshing wines, for which Macon enjoys renown. While M. Méchinet plied knife and fork with amazing earnestness, I glanced round the cosy little room, and stole a look at plump, pleasant-faced Madame Caroline, so attentive and so full of spirits— asking myself if this were really the abode of one of those 'ferocious' detectives, so erroneously portrayed by ignorant novelists.

However, the first requirements of hunger were soon appeased, and M. Méchinet then began to relate our expedition to his wife. He spoke with great precision, entering into the most minute particulars; and,— seated beside him, she listened with an air of shrewd sagacity, interrupting him every now and then to ask for explanations on some obscure point, but without expressing any opinion of her own. However, I divined that her own views were to come, for, plainly enough, I was in presence of one of those homely Egerias, who are not merely accustomed to be consulted, but are also wont to give advice— and to see that advice followed.

In fact, as soon as M. Méchinet had finished his narrative, she drew herself up, and exclaimed, 'You have made one very great blunder, and, to my mind, an irreparable one.'

'And what is that, pray?'

'Why, on leaving Batignolles, you ought not to have gone to the Prefecture.'

'But Monistrol—'

'Ah!yes, I know; you wanted to question him. But what was the use of it?' 'Well, my examination enlightened me—'

'Not at all. Instead of going to headquarters you should have hurried to the Rue Vivienne, have seen the wife and questioned her. You would have surprised her while she was still under the effects of the emotion which her husband's arrest must necessarily have caused her; and if she was an accomplice in the crime, as must be supposed, you might, with a little skill, have easily made her confess.'

On hearing this I almost sprung from my chair with surprise.

'What?' cried I. 'Do you really think that Monistrol is guilty, madame?'

She hesitated for a moment and then replied, 'Yes, I fancy so.'

On hearing that, I wished to urge my own views of the case, but she prevented me from doing so by swifdy resuming: 'One thing I'm certain of— positively certain— the idea of that murder came from Monistrol's wife. Of every twenty crimes that men commit, fifteen are certainly planned or inspired by women. Just ask my husband if that is not the case. And besides, you ought to have been enlightened by the statements which the doorkeeper at Batignolles made. Who is this Madame Monistrol? You were told that she is very beautiful, very coquettish and ambitious, hankering after wealth, and wont to lead her husband by the nose. Now what was her position prior to the crime? Was it not needy, straightened, and precarious? She was greatly vexed, no doubt; she suffered acutely at not being able to satisfy her tastes for expense; and we find proof of that in the fact that she asked her husband's uncle to lend them a large sum. The old man refused to do so, and all her hopes were crushed. She must have hated him after that; and no doubt she often said to herself, "If that old miser only died, we should be in comfortable circumstances." But the old man still lived on; he was hale and hearty yet, and his fortune seemed a long way off. She no doubt asked herself, "Is he going to live a hundred years? Why, at this rate, when he dies we shall have no teeth left, and besides, who can tell, perhaps he means to bury us." That was undoubtedly her starting point. With such ideas in her head she was led by a natural gradation to think of committing a crime. And when she had determined in her own mind that, as the old man would not take himself off in the ordinary course of nature, he must be got rid of by foul means, she no doubt began to weigh on her husband, inspiring him with the idea of murder, and seeking to silence his qualms of conscience, till at last, when all was ripe, she virtually put the knife in his hand. Threatened with bankruptcy, maddened by his wife's lamentations, the unfortunate fellow started off, and murdered his uncle in a foolish, blundering manner no doubt, and without even thinking of the consequences that might overtake himself.'

'All that is logical enough,' opined M. Méchinet, when his wife, who had worked herself into a state of considerable excitement whilst speaking at length brought her address to a close.

Logical— yes, no doubt it was; but then, what became of the various particulars we had noted? I could not forget my own observations at Batignolles; and so, turning to Madame Méchinet, I asked her,

'Then you think that Monistrol was fool enough to denounce himself by writing his own name in blood on the floor?'

'Fool enough?' she answered, with a slight shrug of the shoulders. 'But come now, was it such an act of folly after all? I myself don't think so; for it is this very circumstance that constitutes your greatest argument in favour of his innocence.'

This reasoning was so specious that I was for a moment disconcerted.

'But he confesses his guilt,' I urged, as soon as I recovered myself.

'Well, that's an excellent system to induce the police to establish his innocence.'

'Oh, madame!'

'Why, you yourself are proof of that, Monsieur Godeuil.'

'But the unfortunate fellow doesn't even know how his uncle was murdered.'

'Excuse me, suppose he only pretended that he didn't know it— that would be a very different thing.'

My discussion with Madame Méchinet was becoming heated, and no doubt it would have lasted some time longer, if at this point her husband had thought fit to intervene.

'Come, come, Caroline,' said he, 'you are really too romantic tonight.' And, speaking to me, he added, 'I will knock at your door tomorrow morning, and we will go together to see Madame Monistrol. For the present, goodnight. I'm quite tired and half asleep already.'

He was a happy man, my neighbour, to be able to sleep in blissful forgetfulness of the problem waiting to be solved. No doubt he had only acquired this faculty of isolating his mind from his daily labours after long years of practice and experience. He had had to deal with so many crimes before, he had had to investigate such strange, mysterious cases, and almost invariably with satisfactory results, that he probably considered it futile to rack his mind, at night-time, about such an affair as this, knowing well enough that when he awoke refreshed on the morrow, he would be able to weigh and estimate all the accumulated items of evidence with a clear head.

But then, I was very differently situated; I stood on the threshold of terra incognita, too absorbed and perplexed for my thoughts to allow me a moment's rest. Thus I did not close my eyes all night. A mysterious voice seemed to rise from the innermost recesses of my being and murmur, 'Monistrol is innocent!' I pictured to myself the unfortunate fellow's sufferings as he lay on his camp bedstead at the Dépôt; and at the thought that his agony was perhaps undeserved my heart softened with compassion. But then, in the midst of these phases of pity, the same question invariably returned to my mind, rekindling all my perplexity, 'If Monistrol were really innocent, why had he pleaded guilty?'

viii

WHAT LACKED me in those days— as I subsequently had a hundred occasions of observing— was experience, professional practice, and exact knowledge of the means of investigation at the disposal of the police. I vaguely realised that this inquiry had been conducted in a far too haphazard, superficial manner; but I should have been greatly embarrassed had I been called upon to point out the mistakes that had been made, or to say what ought to have been done. And yet at the same time I took, as I have already said, a passionate interest in Monistrol. It indeed seemed to me as if his cause were mine; and, after all, the feeling was but a natural one. for was not my own reputation for acumen at stake? The first doubt concerning his guilt had been occasioned by an observation I myself had made, and it seemed to me as if I were now bound to prove his innocence. But then my discussion with Madame Méchinet, and the latter's romantic and yet not illogical theories, had so disconcerted me that I did not know what fact to select for the foundation of my defence. At each circumstance I turned to I was met by Madame Caroline's objections, and I wandered restlessly from one to the other without knowing at which to pause. As always happens when the mind is applied during too long a time to the solution of a problem, my ideas at last became as entangled as a skein in a child's hands. I could distinguish nothing clearly, and was only conscious of chaos. It was nine o'clock in the morning, and I was still busy torturing my brain, when M. Méchinet, mindful of the promise he had made the night before, entered my room to inform me that it was time to start. 'Come, come,' said he; 'let us be off.' I sprang to my feet at once, and followed him out of the room. We hastily went downstairs, and on reaching the street I noticed that my worthy neighbour was rather more carefully dressed than usual. He had succeeded in giving himself that well-to-do, easily-pleased air which Parisian shopkeepers delight to find among their customers; and he was, moreover, radiant with all the gaiety of a man who knows that he is marching to certain victory.

'Well?' he asked, as we walked down the Rue Racine, side by side; 'well, what do you think of my wife? The big guns at the Prefecture consider me to be a shrewd fellow, and yet you see I consult her; and I may add that I have often done so with profit. After all, where's the harm? Wasn't Moliére in the habit of consulting his servant Caroline certainly has one little failing, as perhaps you may have noticed. To her mind, there are no stupid crimes, and so she invests every scamp with most diabolical powers of invention. However, my failing is just of the opposite kind. While she is always hunting after romance, I am rather too much inclined to look merely at positive-facts. But, by combining our two systems— taking a little of the one, and a little of the other— it generally happens that we ultimately arrive at the truth.'

'What!' cried I, interrupting M. Méchinet ; 'do you think that you have penetrated this Monistrol mystery?'

He stopped short, drew his huge snuif-box from his pocket, took three or four imaginary pinches, according to his wont, and then, in a tone of mingled reserve and satisfaction, replied, 'Well, at least I possess the means of penetrating it.'

'Oh!' stammered I, wondering what this means might be, and yet deterred from further questioning by my companion's air of discretion. But my mind was soon busy with a new train of thought.

Crossing the Seine by the Pont des Arts, and traversing the courtyard of the Louvre, we had made for our destination by way of the Rue Croix des Petits Champs and the Bank of France. The streets were all alive with traffic; merchants and clerks were hurrying in and out of the bank; the neighbouring shops displayed a variety of costly wares. Signs of luxurious prosperity were indeed apparent on every side, and as I noted them I could not help remembering that surroundings often have a decisive influence on character. What indeed was Clara Monistrol, according to Mme Méchinet's theory? An ambitious, coquettish woman, fond of display, hankering after wealth, and envious oi other folks' good fortune. Even if the evil grain had not pre-existed in her mind, might not the seeds of covetousness have been sown by life in such a centre?

The Rue Vivienne is no fit abode for poverty or struggling circumstances. From one end to another you can hear the jingle of specie and the rustle of flimsies. Here are the Boulevards— all life, splendour, and display; here at mid-distance is the Bourse— the Giant Temple of Mammon— crowded each afternoon with the devotees of fortune; here, at each step you take, are the offices of money-changers, stockbrokers, and bill-discounters; and even when wealth does not assert itself in the shape of bullion, notes, and shares, it is present in a thousand other forms. Here is some shop-window crowded with precious works of art; here are tantalising toilettes and bewitching bonnets; and here, at the photograph stores, are portraits upon portraits of wonderfully-adorned actresses, and elegant belles of society— all appealing to the mind of a covetous woman, eager for wealth and anxious to be admired. And note that the Bank of France, with its cellars full of millions, is but a stone's throw off; and that the Palais Royal, with its galleries scintillating with diamonds, stands at the top of the street. What a neighbourhood for such a woman as Madame Monistrol!

If the portrait sketched by the doorkeeper of Batignolles were faithful to reality, and if Mme Méchinet's deductions were correct, must not Clara Monistrol have endured unspeakable torture, living, in her comparative poverty, in the midst of this Eldorado? Must she not have been perpetually tantalised, tempted, goaded on by the every-day spectacle of all this wealth— all these pricely wares, of all these cosdy adornments? She had looked no doubt with hungry eyes on many a coveted object, and the thought that there was only that litde old man at Batignolles between her present envy and the attainment of her desifes, had returned and returned, with increasing force, until at last she was persuaded to instigate this crime. Looking at the case in this light, and leaving my previous observations on one side, it really seemed to assume a very different aspect. But I was unable to carry my deductions further, for, at this point, worthy M. Méchinet interrupted my reverie.

We had just reached the Rue Vivienne, and stood at the corner of the National Library.

'Now, follow me,' said my neighbour; 'keep your eyes and ears open, but don't speak unless we remain alone; and, no matter what happens, be careful not to express any surprise.'

He did well to warn me, for otherwise I should not have failed to manifest my astonishment at the course he took a moment later. Abruptly crossing the street, he walked straight into an umbrella shop— one of those fashionable establishments where only the most costly articles are sold. As stiff and as grave as an Englishman, he made the mistress of the shop show him, in turn, well nigh every umbrella she had in stock. But nothing seemed to please him; he rejected even the most perfect articles, always having some objection ready to meet the praises which the shopkeeper lavished on her goods. At last, he asked her if she could not undertake to make him an umbrella on a pattern he would furnish.

'It would be the simplest thing in the world,' she answered; and thereupon M Mlchinet promised that he would return on the morrow with the pattern in question. The woman conducted us back to the door with many marks of deference— for, in Paris, the more fastidious a customer shows himself, the more he rises in a dealer's esteem— and the next moment we stood on the pavement outside, myself with admiration glowing on my face, and M. Méchinet with a radiant air of self-satisfaction. The fact is, that he had good reason to be satisfied, for the half-hour spent in that shop had by no means been thrown away.

Whilst examining all the umbrellas that were shown to him, he had skilfully contrived to pump the shopwoman of all she knew about the Monistrols, both man and wife. After all, it was a comparatively easy matter, for the murder of the little old man of Batignolles, and the arrest of the dealer in imitation jewellery had caused a perfect sensation throughout the neighbourhood of the Rue Vivienne, and formed the one great topic of current gossip.

'There!' exclaimed M. Méchinet, as we proceeded slowly along the street. There, that's how we obtain trustworthy information! If I presented myself in my real character, folks would assume a pompous air, launch forth grandiloquent phrases about vice and virtue, and then goodbye to plain, simple, unvarnished truth!'

My neighbour enacted the same little comedy in seven or eight other shops of various kinds along the street; and in one establishment, where the dealer and his wife at first showed themselves somewhat reserved and taciturn, he contrived to loosen their tongues by expending a 'napoleon' on a little purchase. To my amusement we spent a couple of hours or so in this fashion, and then M. Méchinet opined that further inquiries would be superfluous, for we now knew enough to gauge the current of public opinion. In point of fact, we were very fairly acquainted with what the tradesfolk of the neighbourhood thought of M and Madame Monistrol, who had resided in the Rue Vivienne ever since their marriage, some four years previously.

There was but one opinion concerning the husband. He was, according to general report, a very good-natured, worthy man— obliging, honest, industrious, and fairly intelligent. It was scarcely his fault, we were told, if his business had not prospered. Fortune does not always smile on those who are most deserving of her favours. Monistrol, it appeared, had acted unwisely in taking a shop which seemed fated to bankruptcy, for, within a period of fifteen years, four dealers of different trades had failed in it. The jeweller was greatly attached to his wife— every one knew it, and repeated it; but he had not unduly paraded his affection, or shown himself extravagantly uxorious and jealous.

None of the people whom M. Méchinet questioned believed in Monistrol's guilt. In fact, they invariably remarked: 'The police must have made a mistake, and will soon find it out.'

In reference to Madame Monistrol, opinions were on one point divided. Some of the neighbours considered that her tastes were of too elegant a character for her position, whilst others opined that in a shop like her husband's, it was imperative that the mistress should be fashionably attired. However, it was only on this question that our informants differed. They united in declaring that Madame Monistrol was greatly attached to her husband. Her virtue, they said, was unimpeachable. No one had ever heard of her flirting or carrying her coquetry beyond the bounds of personal adornment; and one individual naively remarked that her conduct in this respect was most meritorious, for she was remarkably beautiful, and had any number of admirers. But she had always remained deaf to their pleadings, and her reputation as a faithful wife was absolutely immaculate.

This information plainly worried M. Méchinet .

'It's wonderful,' said he to me. 'No slander, no back-biting, no queer little stories of misconduct! I begin to think that my wife must have been mistaken. According to her idea, Madame Monistrol ought to have been one of those brazen beauties who rule the household, and who are fonder of displaying their own charms than their husband's merchandise, one of those women, indeed, whose husbands are either blind fools or else shameful accomplices. And yet I find nothing of all that. The very most that people say, is, that she is rather fond of dress, but, then, that's the case with well nigh every pretty woman in the world; and because she has a few elegant whims and a little taste we've no right to brand her with infamy.'

I made no reply to these remarks. To tell the truth, I was quite as disconcerted as the detective. What a difference between the fairly eulogious statements made by the neighbours and the disparaging assertions of the doorkeeper at Batignolles! However, perhaps the discrepancy might be explained; for, as it occurred to my mind just then, people in different circumstances take different views of things. And moreover, opinions vary with localities. What seems altogether scandalous and disgraceful in the Rue de Lécluse is justifiable, seemly, and even requisite in the Rue Vivienne. The staid and quiet quarter of Batignolles, and the ostentatious easy-going district of the Bourse can scarcely be expected to share the same notions of morality.

However, we had already spent too much time in prosecuting our inquiry to think of pausing to discuss our impressions and conjectures.

'Now,' said M. Méchinet, 'before we tackle the enemy let's have a look at his quarters.' And familiar with the practice of carrying on these delicate investigations in the midst of the traffic and bustle of Paris, he drew me under an arched gateway situated just in front of Monistrol's shop.

It was a modest-looking shop indeed, almost a beggarly one, when compared with the fashionable establishments around. The weather-stained front, for instance, sadly required a coat of paint. Above the windows one could read the name of 'MONISTROL', formerly traced in gilt letters, but now blackened and dingy, whilst across the panes of glass, on either side of the door, ran the inscription, 'GOLD AND IMITATION.'Among the articles displayed to view there were, however, but few of standard ore. The imitation goods formed nineteen twentieths of the stock. Steel-gilt chains, jet ornaments, diadems to which rhinestones and strass lent a fugitive, subdued brilliancy, imitation coral necklets, with brooches, rings, studs, and sleeve links set with false stones of every hue, were displayed in considerable profusion, but their spurious character was altogether too evident for the passing window thief to be deceived.

'Well, let's go in,' said I to M Mlchinet, after making a brief survey of the shop.

But the detective was less impatient than myself, or rather he was more expert in restraining his impatience, for catching me by the arm, he exclaimed, 'One moment please. Before entering, I should just like to have a glimpse of Madame Monistrol.'

However, although we remained for another twenty minutes at our post of observation under the archway, the shop remained deserted. There were no signs whatever of the beautiful Madame Clara, and indeed, we did not even perceive a shop boy or a shop girl behind the counter.

'Well, well, that's enough waiting,' opined my companion at last. 'Come on, Monsieur Godeuil, let us chance it.'

ix

TO REACH Monistrol's shop we had only to cross the street, a feat we performed in four strides. On hearing us open the door a slatternly looking little servant girl, of fifteen or sixteen years of age, with a dirty face and ill-combed hair, came out of a room in the rear of the shop.

'What do the gendemen require? asked she.

'Is Madame Monistrol indoors?'

'Yes, sir, she's in the room there, and I'll run and tell her you want her, for, you see—'

But M. Méchinet did not allow the maid to finish. He roughly pushed her aside, and exclaimed: 'That'll do; as she's there, I'll go and speamj her.' And the next moment he walked straight into the room at the rear of the shop. I followed close behind him on the tiptoe of curiosity and expectation, feeling as it were a kind of presentiment that this visit would result in any explanation of the mystery. I required some little energy to preserve an appearance of calmness, for to tell the truth, my mind was terribly excited, and I could hear my temples throb, and my heart beat pit-a-pat, with most unwonted violence.

The apartment in the rear of the shop was a dreary looking chamber, which apparently did joint duty, as dining-room, drawing-room and bedroom. It was in a state of considerable disorder, and its appointments were such as are common to the abodes of people in straightened circumstances who wish to appear rich. At the further end stood a bedstead partially concealed by pretentiously draped curtains of blue damask. The pillow cases were fringed round with lace and embroidered with huge initial letters, and the rug at the foot of the bed was a flowery imitation of the Aubusson style. In striking contrast with this attempted display of magnificence, appeared the table in the centre of the room. Its greasy oil cloth covering was bestrewn with the remnants of what could not have been a particularly appetising breakfast, served in crockery of the commonest kind.

Reclining beside this table in a capacious arm chair, I perceived a young woman, with fair hair and blue eyes, who held between her fingers a legal document on stamped paper. This then was the beautiful Madame Monistrol. Her charms had certainly not been exaggerated. She was slightly above the average height, but admirably proportioned, as with my professional knowledge of anatomy I easily perceived, despite her somewhat recumbent position. Her nose would have done honour to a Grecian beauty, and her lips— although somewhat deficient in colour, a circumstance no doubt due to emotion— offered the graceful curves of Cupid's bow. Her ears were particularly tiny and well shaped, and her bowed neck, on which lingered the wavy curls of her back hair, seemed as white and as smooth as polished alabaster. Her feet could not be seen from where I stood; but no doubt they were as exquisitely modelled as her hands, which, with their fair white skin, their network of pale blue veins, and their tapering fingers tipped with glistening pink nails, would have fairly sent an artist into raptures.

It would be futile to conceal it. I was at first fairly dazzled by this woman's amazing beauty, and, reversing all Madame Méchinet's theories concerning her culpability, I decided in my own mind, that it was quite impossible such a lovely creature could have instigated the heinous crime of the Rue de Lécluse.

But this impression only lasted for a moment, so contradictory and so versatile indeed were my ideas at that prefatory epoch of my career as a detective. It was her dress that made me change my mind. She was in deep mourning, wearing a robe of black crape, cut slightly low at the neck. Now black is admirably adapted to set off fair complexions, and naturally enough this toilette greatly enhanced Madame Clara's charms. But on reflection, it seemed to me that a person labouring under deep grief, a prey in fact to harrowing sorrow, would scarcely have had the requisite presence of mind to array herself in this preposessing style; and I could not help asking myself if Madame Monistrol were not, after all, an actress who had deliberately assumed the costume of the part she meant to play.

On perceiving us enter the room, she sprang to her feet like a frightened doe, and asked in a tearful voice: 'What do you desire, gentlemen?'

From the gleam in M. Méchinet 's eyes I could judge that he had mentally made the same remarks as myself.

'Madame,' he answered, sternly, 'I am sent here by the judicial authorities. I am an agent of the detective police.'

At this announcement she sunk back into her armchair, sobbing, and to all appearance overcome; but suddenly, inflamed as it were with nervous enthusiasm, with bright eyes and quivering lips, she rose once more to her feet, exclaiming in impassioned tones:

'Do you come to arrest me, then? Ah! I could bless you for it. Come, I am ready. Lead me away! Let me join the honest man whom you arrested last night! Whatever may be his fate I wish to share it. He is as guiltless as I am myself; but no matter, if he is fated to be the victim of a judicial error, it will be a last joy for me to die beside him!'

She was interrupted by a prolonged growl, coming from one of the corners of the room.

I looked up and perceived a black dog, who showed his teeth and glared at us as if he meant mischief.

'Down, Pluto, down!' exclaimed Madame Monistrol. 'Come, go to bed and keep quiet. These gentlemen don't mean me any harm.'

At first the animal seemed disinclined to obey his mistress's command, but at last, without once averting his glaring gaze, he slowly backed under the bedstead, where in the shadow I could still distinguish his bright eyes fixed upon us.

'You are right in saying that we don't mean you any harm, madame,' remarked M. Méchinet . 'We have not come to arrest you.'

He no doubt trusted that this intelligence would draw from her some expression feeling indicative of her hopes or fears; but he was mistaken, for she not seem to heed it.

'This morning,' she resumed, glancing at the paper in her hand, 'I received this summons, which orders me to be at the office of an investigating magistrate at the Palace of Justice, at three o'clock this afternoon. What can be wanted of me, good heavens! what can be wanted of me?'

'Why, information, madame,' promptly answered M. Méchinet . 'Information that may enlighten justice, and, as I hope, prove your husband's innocence. Pray don't look on me as an enemy. Indeed, so far as my professional character allows, I sincerely sympathise with you in your misfortune. My only object, my only ambition is to arrive at the truth.'

So saying my neighbour drew fqrth his snuff-box and took a score or so of imaginary pinches.

'You will therefore understand, madame,' he resumed, in a solemn tone which I had never heard him employ before; 'you will understand how important may prove your answers to the questions I shall have the honour of asking you. And so may I beg you to answer hie frankly?'

For fully half a minute Madame Clara fixed her big blue eyes on my neighbour and gazed at him through her tears.

'Question me, monsieur,' she said at last.

For the third time I must repeat it; I was altogether without experience, and yet the manner in which M. Méchinet had initiated this interrogatory caused me intense dissatisfaction. It seemed to me that he betrayed all his perplexity and wandered on in haphazard fashion, instead of marching straight towards a predetermined object. Ah! how my tongue itched! How I should have liked to intervene. If I had only dared.... But then, of course, I was no one; I had no locus standi, and was merely there on sufferance. However, during the last few minutes, my worthy neighbour had greatly fallen in my estimation. I forgot the clever manner in which he had questioned Monistrol the night before; and it seemed to me that if he were well up in the routine of his profession, he was, at all events, quite deficient in that analytical, investigative genius, without which a man cannot hope to become a great detective. Indeed, it really seemed to me that I was his superior in the latter respect, despite my comparative youth and imperfect knowledge of men and things; and hence I suffered all the more acutely at having to stand still and listen to what I considered his blunders, without any right to intervene and repair them.

My worthy neighbour was, of course, blissfully ignorant of what was passing in my mind. Seating himself on a chair in front of Madame Monistrol, he began as follows:

'As no doubt you are aware, madame, it was after nine o'clock on the night before last that Monsieur Pigoreau, or Anténor, as some people called him— in one word, your husband's uncle— was murdered at Batignolles.'

'Alas! yes; so I have been told,' answered Madame Clara.

'Now can you tell me,' continued the detective, 'where Monsieur Monistrol was between nine o'clock and midnight?'

'Ah, Lord!' groaned the jeweller's wife, clasping her hands with anguish. 'What a fatality!'

M. Méchinet paid no heed to the exclamation.

'Excuse me,' he resumed; 'you must be able to tell us where your husband was on the evening before last?'

It was some little time before Madame Monistrol was able to reply, for sobs were rising in her throat and seemed to choke her utterance. At last, mastering her grief, she murmured:

'On the day before yesterday my husband spent the evening away from home.'

'Do you know where he was?'

'Ah, yes, I can tell you that. One of our work-people, living at Montrouge, was engaged on a set of false pearls, and had failed to deliver them as promised. We were afraid that the person who had ordered them of us would leave them on our hands, which would have been very annoying, for we are far from rich, and business is bad enough already. So, while we were at dinner that evening, my husband said to me: "I think I had better go to Montrouge and see if those pearls are not ready yet." And sure enough, after dinner— rather before nine o'clock— he went out, and I accompanied him as far as the corner of the Rue de Richelieu, where I saw him take the omnibus myself.'

I began to breathe again. My original idea had been the right one, and Monistrol was innocent; for surely his wife's reply meant an unimpeachable alibi. M. Méchinet no doubt had the same thought, for he continued in a softer tone. 'If that is the case, your workman could state that M Monistrol was with him somewhere about eleven o'clock?'

'Ah! unfortunately no.'

'No? And why not pray?'

'Because he was not at home. My husband did not see him.'

'That is a great misfortune. But still the doorkeeper of the house must have known of M Monistrol's visit.'

'No, monsieur. In fact there is no doorkeeper in the house where our workman lives.'

This might be the truth. Similar things have been heard of before; and yet the judicial authorities would undoubtedly consider the circumstance as a most suspicious one, indeed as an additional indication of the prisoner's guilt. At all events, with such glaring absence of proof, the plea of an alibi became quite untenable. Was it this, then, that had impelled Monistrol to plead guilty? Had he realised that this improbable story of a journey to Montrouge, to a workman who was not at home, and who lived in a house where there was no doorkeeper, would only cause both judge and jury to shrug their shoulders with contempt? Perhaps he had. He had very likely said to himself, 'I am the victim of a fatal combination of circumstances. My statements would be set down as a parcel of lies, concocted in the vain hope of saving myself from the guillotine. I should be doubly branded with infamy; and so it is best that I should accept my fate and bow my head to the last stroke of that ill luck which has so persistendy followed me through life.'

Whilst I was pursuing this train of thought, M. Méchinet had resumed his interrogation.

'At what time did your husband come home?' he asked.

'At sometime after midnight.'

'Didn't you think he had been a long while gone?'

'Oh yes! Indeed, I spoke to him about it, but he said he had come back on foot, and loitered on his way. If I recollect rightly, he had rested in a cafe and drunk a glass of beer.'

'And pray what did he look like when he came home?'

'Well, he looked annoyed, but that was only natural.'

'What clothes was he wearing?'

'The same as when he was arrested.'

'And you didn't notice anything extraordinary about his manner or appearance.'

'No, nothing.'

x

STANDING, at a few paces behind M. Méchinet, I was able to watch Madame Monistrol's features at leisure, and take due note of her slightest change of expression. She seemed to be overcome with deep grief, and big tears streamed down her pale cheeks. And yet at certain moments I fancied I could detect something like a suppressed gleam of joy in the depths of her big, blue eyes.

'Is she guilty then?' I asked myself.

This was not the first time that the idea had occurred to me, and now, as I stood there watching the jeweller's wife, it returned and returned with such obstinate persistency, that at last I could control myself no longer. Forgetful of M. Méchinet 's recommendations, oblivious of the fact that I had no right to interfere in the proceedings, I took a few steps forward, and roughly asked:

'But you, madame, where were you on that fatal evening, while your husband was uselessly journeying to Montrouge, to see his workman?'

She raised her blue eyes to mine, gave me a long look of surprise, and then softly answered:

'I was here, monsieur, as witnesses can prove to you.'

'Witnesses!'

'Yes, monsieur. It was so very warm that evening, that I felt I should like an ice. As it worried me to take it alone, I sent my servant to invite two of my neighbours, Madame Dorstrich, the bootmaker's wife, next door, and Macule Rivaille, who keeps the glove shop over the way. They both accepted my invitation, and remained here with me till half-past eleven o'clock. You may question them, and they will tell you that such was the case. In the midst of all these cruel trials, this accidental circumstance is really a favour from on high.'

Was the circumstance of such a purely accidental character as Madame Monistrol pretended? This is what we asked each other, M. Méchinet and myself, by means of a rapid questioning glance. When chance acts so appropriately, it may well have been assisted. At least, this is what I thought, and the swift gleam that shot from my neighbour's eyes in my direction seemed to imply that his opinion was the same. However, this was scarcely the moment for an exchange of observations, which would assuredly have proved suspicious to Madame Monistrol.

'You have never been suspected, madame,' declared M. Méchinet, with rare effrontery. 'The worst that was supposed was that your husband might perhaps have said something to you before committing this crime.'

'Ah!monsieur!' ejaculated Madame Monistrol. 'Ah! if you only knew us!'

'One moment, pray. We have been told that your husband's business was not a prosperous one, that he was in needy circumstances.'

'Yes, lately, it is true; trade has not been very bright.'

'Now your husband must have been very worried and anxious on account of his precarious position. He must have particularly suffered on thinking of you, his wife, to whom he was so attached. For your sake, more than for himself, your husband must have longed to attain a position of ease and fortune.'

'Ah! monsieur, I can only repeat it, he is innocent.'

M. Méchinet assumed a pensive air, and pretended to fill his nose with snuff; but suddenly raising his head again he exclaimed: 'Then, sacre-bleu, how do you explain his confession? For an innocent man to plead guilty as soon as the crime he stands accused of is mentioned to him is most singular, madame— singular, and indeed, astounding.'

A fleeting blush coloured Madame Méchinet's cheeks, and for the first time, since the beginning of the interrogation, her glance wavered. Was this to be interpreted as a sign of guilt?

'I suppose,' she answered in a low voice, which a fresh fit of sobbing rendered almost inaudible; 'I suppose that my poor husband was so frightened and stupefied at finding himself accused of such a frightful cime, that he fairly lost his head.'

M. Méchinet shrugged his shoulders. 'At the very most,' said he, 'the idea of passing delirium might be entertained; but after a long night's reflection, M Monistrol has this very morning persisted in his original avowals.'

Was this true? Had my worthy neighbour been to the Prefecture before calling me, or had he deemed it useful to make this statement without authority? At all events, the news had a crushing effect on Madame Monistrol. She turned ashy white, and I really thought that she was going to faint. We were both looking at her intently, and it seemed as if she could not bear our gaze, for suddenly she hid her face in her hands and murmured, 'O Lord, O Lord, my poor husband has gone mad.'

Such was certainly not my opinion. In fact, I had very different views. I was becoming more and more convinced that this scene, so far as Madame Clara was concerned, was merely so much pure comedy. Her great despair was to my mind so much affectation, and I asked myself if she were not in some fashion or other the cause of her husband's singular attitude, and if she were not also acquainted with the true culprit. Whilst I was thinking, however, M. Méchinet continued to talk. He endeavoured to console Madame Monistrol by a few set phrases which could not possibly compromise him, and then gave her to understand that she might silence a great many suspicions by allowing him to make a minute perquisition throughout the establishment. She accepted the suggestion with unfeigned alacrity and pleasure.

'Everything is at your disposal, gentlemen,' said she. 'Examine everything. I shall really feel obliged by your doing so; and besides it won't take you very long, for we only rent the shop, this room, our servant's room on the top floor, and a little cellar. Here are the keys of everything!'

To my very great astonishment, M. Méchinet expressed his readiness to make a search at once; and forthwith he began ferreting round the room, examining everything with the greatest attention. What could be his object? I wondered. Surely he must have some secret motive; for was it likely that such a perquisition— so readily authorised— would lead to any important discovery? After exploring the shop and the room with as much care as if he had expected to light upon the missing fink in our chain of evidence, he turned to Madame Monistrol and remarked?

'Well, there's only the cellar left for us to look at now.'

'I'll show you the way, monsieur,' she answered; and, taking a candlestick and a box of lucifers from off the mantelpiece, she conducted us out of the room into a courtyard behind. We descended a score of slippery stone steps by the light of the flickering candle, and halted in front of an old door covered with cobwebs and mildew.

'Here's the cellar,' observed Madame Monistrol, unfastening the padlock; and the next moment pushing back the door, she led the way inside. It was a damp, ill-kept vault, and its contents were in keeping with the Monistrols' needy circumstances. In one corner was a little barrel of beer, and just in front a cask of Wine, more or less securely perched on a few logs of wood. Taps were affixed both to the beer barrel and the wine cask, showing that they were both on draught. On the right hand side were three or four dozen bottles of wine, probably of a superior kind, ranged on lathes; and in a third corner an equal number of empty bottles could be perceived.

I was now beginning to realise M. Méchinet 's object. He scarcely glanced at the casks, but taking the candle from Madame Monistrol, he scrutinised the full and the empty bottles with equal attention. I carefully followed his inspection, and like himself I noted that not one of these bottles was sealed with green wax. Thus the inference was, that the cork discovered on the floor in the bedroom at Batignolles, and in which the murderer had evidendy imbedded his dagger's point, had not come from Monistrol's cellar. As M. Méchinet was almost as prepossessed as myself in favour of the jeweller's innocence, this result ought to have delighted him; but whatever may have been his secret feelings, he thought fit to assume a look of intense disappointment and remarked, 'Well, I find nothing— nothing at all; so I think we may go upstairs again.'

I walked the first on this occasion, and thus reached the room in the rear of the shop before the others. Scarcely had I opened the door when Pluto, the black dog with the glaring eyes and ferocious growl, sprang from his resting place under the bed in such a threatening manner that I instinctively retreated a few paces back.

'He seems to be an unpleasant customer that dog of yours,' said M. Méchinet to Madame Monistrol.

'No, no,' she answered with a wave of the hand, which calmed Pluto as if by magic. 'He's a good fellow, but then, you know, he's a watch dog. We jewellers have so many thieves to fear; and so we have trained him to keep a sharp look out.'

The animal was quiet enough now that his mistress was beside hinrf; and, wishing to coax him into a more friendly disposition, I called him by his name: 'Here, Pluto, here!'

'Oh, it's quite useless for you to call him,' carelessly remarked Madame Monistrol. 'He won't obey you.'

'Indeed. Why not?'

'Why, like all dogs of his breed, he's very faithful. He only knows his master and me.'

Many people would have considered such an answer to be altogether insignificant, and yet to me it was as a ray of light shed on the mystery we were investigating. Without pausing to reflect, yielding to the first impulse that entered my head, I eagerly asked: 'And pray, madame, where was this faithful dog on the night of the crime?'

So great was Madame Monistrol's emotion and surprise at being asked this question, point blank, that she started back and almost let her candlestick fall from her hand.

'I don't know,' she stammered; 'I don't recollect—'

'Perhaps he followed your husband,' I resumed.

'Yes— now I think of it. I fancy he did.'

'So you have trained him to follow vehicles then; for you told us that you saw your husband get on the 'bus.'

She made no rejoinder, and I was about to continue when M. Méchinet forestalled me. Far from seeking to profit by Madame Monistrol's confusion, he did everything he could to set her mind at ease, and after advising her in her own interest to comply with the summons she had received from the investigating magistrate, he bade her good morning, and led me away.

'Have you lost your head?' he asked, when we had walked a few yards down the street.

Lost my head, indeed! Such a remark was fairly an insult.

'You are really too hard on me, M. Méchinet,' said I, 'Few people in their senses could have done more than I have just accomplished. For if I haven't solved the problem, at all events I've shown how it may be solved. Monistrol's dog will lead us to the truth.'

This outburst made my worthy neighbour smile.

'You are right,' said he in a paternal tone; 'I quite understood your question about the dog. Only I fear you put it too abruptly. If Madame Monistrol has divined your suspicions, you may be sure that the animal will be dead, or have disappeared before the day is over.'

xi

YES, I had certainly been most imprudent. There could be no doubt of that. But on the other hand, I had discovered the weak point in the enemy's armour, the flaw which would enable us to penetrate a most artful system of defence. My worthy neighbour was fairly bowled over. Here was he, a celebrity so to say in his profession, possessed of vast experience, and said to be most shrewd. Now, what result had he arrived at during this long interrogation? Just none at all.'

He had wandered through and through the maze without finding the smallest outlet, whilst I, a mere apprentice, had discovered the right road at my very first venture. Another man might have shown himself jealous of my success, but M. Méchinet was not given to envious thoughts. His only desire was to utilise my discovery to the very best advantage; and accordingly we decided to hold council at a neighbouring restaurant, one of the best places for a dejeuner a la fouchette in this part of Paris.

Without neglecting to ply our knives and forks, for our morning's labours had whetted our appetites to the right degree, we began by establishing the exact position of the problem, so as to arrive more readily at the required solution. To our minds, Monistrol's innocence was a moral certainty; and we thought we could guess why he had pleaded guilty. However, for the time being, this was a question of secondary importance. As regards Madame Monistrol we were equally certain that she had not left her neighbourhood on the night of the crime; for it was no doubt perfectly true that she had merely accompanied her husband as far as the omnibus in the Rue de Richelieu, and that she had then returned home and spent the whole evening, as she said, in the company of two of her acquaintances. But although it might be proved that she could not possibly have taken any material part in the perpetration of the crime, there remained the charge of moral complicity, in respect of which a logical sequence of deductions seemed to prove her guilt. To our minds she had been fully acquainted with the crime— even if she had not indeed advised and prepared it— and consequently she knew the murderer.

Now, who could the murderer be? Must he not be some man whom Pluto, the black dog, was accustomed to obey quite as readily as he obeyed his master and mistress? For we had unimpeachable evidence that the dog had accompanied the assassin to Batignolles. It is true that, before Madame Monistrol was formally questioned on the subject of the dog, she had casually stated that he only obeyed his master and herself; but her subsequent embarrassment pointed to a very different conclusion. Plainly enough Pluto was in the habit of obeying some third person, with whose name we were so far unacquainted. This person must, however, be a very frequent visitor to the Monistrols' shop, for we ourselves had seen how the dog was in the habit of receiving strangers. And yet, although a frequent visitor, he could scarcely be a friend (at least so far as Monsieur Monistrol was concerned), for the crime at Batignolles had been perpetrated in such a manner as to make the jeweller's guilt seem certain. The murderer must therefore be one of M Monistrol's bitter enemies, for hatred alone could have inspired such fiendish cunning. But on the other hand he must be a very dear indeed to Madame Monistrol; for, although she knew his name, as was morally proven, she refrained from denouncing him, preferring to abandon her husband to the cruel fate he did not deserve.

This course of reasoning could have but one conclusion: Madame Monistrol must have a favoured lover, and that lover must be the murderer of Batignolles. Her neighbours of the Rue Vivienne had no doubt given her a certificate of virtue, but in the circumstances their assurances were insufficient. Women who enjoy the very highest reputations often carry on some shameful secret intrigue for years and years, and are honoured as models of faithfulness and virtue, whereas, if their sin were known, they would be turned from with horror and loathing. Some faithless women possess extraordinary powers of deception, and go to the grave without having been once detected. When started on the road to error, their minds prove fertile in all the resources of hypocrisy and cunning, and although the hundred eyes of Argus may be on them, their secret remains safe. Now, might not Madame Monistrol be one of these women— who are not merely expert in deceiving their husbands, but in deceiving the world as well?

We discussed this question at length, M. Méchinet and I, and our deductions were so fully in keeping with our original theory, that we could not fail to accept them. On the one hand this system proved Monistrol's innocence, even if it did not explain his plea of guilty; and on the other, it was in keeping with a great deal of what Madame Méchinet had said at supper the night before. Clara Monistrol had certainly instigated the crime, but in lieu of entrusting its perpetration to her husband, she had confided it to her lover, hoping to enjoy this ill-gotten wealth in his company, after the unfortunate jeweller had perished on the scaffold, a victim of judicial error, like Lesurques in the famous case of the Lyons mail. But then, accepting these premises, who could this lover of hers be, and how could we discover him?

After torturing my mind for some time, I at length ventured to expound a plan. 'It seems to me,' said I to M. Méchinet, 'that the murderer can be easily found out. He and Madame Monistrol must have agreed not to see each other for some little time after the crime. The most elementary rules of prudence must have impelled them to take that course. The man will no doubt remain quiet enough. He must know that a false move would cost him his head, and so he will not dare to show himself in the Rue Vivienne; but, on the other hand, the woman will probably become impatient. She will be anxious to see her accomplice, and, fancying that she has diverted all suspicion from herself, she will not hesitate to go and meet him somewhere. I would therefore suggest that you should employ one of your colleagues to dog her steps, to follow her wherever she may go; and, if this is only done, properly, why, we shall have caught the murderer before another forty-eight hours are over our heads.'

M. Méchinet was grumbling unintelligibly between his teeth, and dipping his fingers into his empty snuff-box with all his wonted persistency. At first he gave me no answer, but suddenly leaning forward he exclaimed:

'That won't do, my dear fellow. We mustn't let the bird slip through our fingers. We must rather strike the iron while it's hot. No doubt you possess the genius requisite for the profession— in fact, I'm sure you do; but you are wanting in experience and practice. However, fortunately I'm here. Now, listen to me. A single phrase put you on the right track, and yet you don't follow up your advantage.'

'I don't understand you.'

'Don't understand me? But that dog, we must turn him to account.'

'How so?'

'Well, wait and you shall see. In an hour's time or so, Madame Monistrol will leave her shop, for she has to be at the Palais de Justice by three o'clock; and the little servant girl will remain behind alone. That will be the time for action, and you will see how I shall settle the whole business.'

I did everything I could to induce M. Méchinet to explain himself properly; but in spite of all my prayers and exhortations he refused to say another word on the subject. He carried me off to the nearest café, and compelled me to play him a game at dominoes, which, as a matter of course, I lost; for my mind was too preoccupied to allow me to engage successfully in such a frivolous pastime, whereas M. Méchinet possessed the happy gift of being able to dismiss business from his thoughts at a moment's notice.

Two o'clock was striking when at last he pushed back the dominoes and exclaimed: 'To work! to work.'

We paid the score and left the café, and a moment later we were standing once more under the arched gateway in front of Monistrol's shop. We had only waited there a few minutes when we saw the door open and the jeweller's wife appear upon the threshold. She wore the same black dress as during the morning, and a long crape veil hung from her bonnet, giving her the appearance of a widow.

'She's a clever wench,' grumbled M. Méchinet between his teeth; 'she means to excite the magistrate's compassion and sympathy.'

Whilst he was speaking she walked swiftly down the street, and soon disappeared from view in the direction of the Palais Royal. However, M. Méchinet decided to wait another five minutes under the archway, and then catching me by the arm he led me towards the shop. As he had opined, the little servant girl was quite alone. She was sitting behind the counter, munching a piece of sugar she had purloined from her mistress. As soon as we entered she recognised us, and rose to her feet with a flushed face and rather frightened air. Before she could open her mouth, however, M. Méchinet roughly asked her: 'Where is Madame Monistrol?'

'She has gone out, monsieur.'

'Gone out! That can't be. You must be deceiving me. She must be in the room there, behind the shop.'

'Oh, no, monsieur; she has really gone out, and if you don't believe me, you may look yourself.'

M. Méchinet struck his forehead, as if he were grievously disappointed.

'What a pity, what a pity!' he repeated. 'How disappointed poor Madame Monistrol will be!'

And as the girl gazed at him, with gaping mouth and astonished eyes, he continued: 'But perhaps you might be able to tell me what I want to know, my good girl. I have only come back because I have lost the address of the person your mistress asked me to visit.'

'What person, monsieur?'

'Ah! you know him. Monsieur... Confound it! Why, I've even forgotten his name now! Monsieur... Monsieur... But surely you'll recollect him. He's the person that your dog Pluto obeys so readily.'

'Ah yes, monsieur!I know who you mean; it's Monsieur Victor.'

'Yes, that's it, to a T. Monsieur Victor! I mustn't forget again. By the way, what does he do, this Monsieur Victor?'

'He's a working jeweller, monsieur. He was a great friend of Monsieur Monistrol's, and they used to work together before M Monistrol set up in business. That's why M Victor can do anything he likes with Pluto.'

'Ah!Then, if that's the case, perhaps you can tell me where this Monsieur Victor lives?'

'Certainly I can, monsieur; he lives at No. 23 Rue du Roi Doré, in the Marais.'

The poor girl was seemingly delighted to be able to furnish all this information; but it was not without a pang that I heard her answer in this trusting manner, unconsciously betraying the secret which her mistress must hold as dear as life itself. M. Méchinet 's was a more hardened nature, however; and far from being touched by this involuntary treachery, he grimly indulged in a stroke of sarcasm.

'Thanks,' said he, as he turned to leave the shop. 'Thanks; you have just rendered your mistress a very great service indeed, and she will be exceedingly pleased with you.'

Then, with a chuckle, he opened the door, and we walked out into the street.

xii

MY FIRST impulse was to hurry off to the Rue du Roi Doré, and apprehend this fellow Victor, who, plainly enough was the real murderer; but M. Méchinet damped my enthusiasm with the remark: 'And the law! Don't you know that we are powerless to act, so long as we are without a warrant? We must first of all, go to the Palais de Justice, and interview the investigating magistrate.'

'But suppose we meet Madame Monistrol there?' I asked. 'If she sees us, she will certainly warn her accomplice.'

'Perhaps so,' retorted M. Méchinet, with undisguised bitterness; 'perhaps so. The culprit may escape, simply because we have to go through so many irksome formalities. Still, I might perchance parry the blow. However, let us make haste. Come, stretch out your legs.'

Anxiety and hope of success lent unparalleled speed to both of us, and a quarter of an hour afterwards we were scrambling up the staircase of the Palais de Justice. The offices occupied by the investigating magistrates communicate with a long gallery, where several attendants are invariably stationed to answer all inquiries.

'Can you tell me,' asked M. Méchinet, in a breathless voice; 'can you tell me if the magistrate who has to deal with the murder of the little old man of Batignolles is in his office?'

'Yes, he is,' answered one of the attendants; 'but he has a witness with him just now— a young woman dressed in black.'

'That must be Madame Monistrol,' whispered the detective in my ear; and then, turning again to the attendant, he added aloud: 'You know who I am, so just give me a pen and a slip of paper, that I may write a word to the magistrate. Take it to him, and bring me back the answer.'

The attendant started off, dragging his shoes along the dusty floor of the gallery, and soon returned to say that the magistrate was waiting for us in an adjoining room. To receive M. Méchinet, he had, indeed, left Madame Monistrol in his own office with his clerk, and had borrowed the use of one of his colleagues' rooms.

'What is the matter?' he asked, in a tone which allowed me to estimate the immense difference between an investigating magistrate and a humble detective. In a clear, brief manner, M. Méchinet related what we had accomplished, what he had learnt, and what we hoped for. But the magistrate scarcely seemed inclined to share our views.

'All that is very interesting,' said he; 'but Monistrol confesses.' And, with an obstinacy that well nigh maddened me, he kept on repeating: 'He confesses, he confesses.'

However, after another series of protracted explanations, he at last consented to sign a warrant authorising my neighbour to apprehend Madame Monistrol's presumed lover— M Victor. As soon as the detective was in possession of this indispensable document, he hurriedly bowed to the magistrate, and bounded out of the room, along the passage, and down the stairs. It was as much as I could do to keep up with him, and, in less than a quarter of an hour, we covered the whole distance, from the Palace of Justice to the Rue du Roi Doré— one of those narrow, unkempt streets in the heart of the Marais, where each tenement is a busy hive of industry, and whence articles de Paris, in all varieties, go forth to the entire world. On reaching the corner of the street, M. Méchinet paused to draw breath.

'Now,' said he, 'attention!'

And, with an air of complete composure, he entered the narrow alley of the house bearing the number 23.

'M. Victor, if you please?' he asked of the doorkeeper.

'On the fourth floor, monsieur— the door on the right hand as you reach the landing.'

'Is he at home?'

'Oh, yes; he must be at work.'

M. Méchinet took a step in the direction of the staircase, and then abruptly pausing, turned round again, faced the doorkeeper, and exclaimed: 'I must treat my old friend, Victor, to a good bottle of wine. What wine shop does he usually go to near here?'

'To the one over the way.'

We reached the shop in six strides, and with the air of an habitue, M. Méchinet immediately ordered: 'A bottle of wine, please— something good. That wine of yours with the green seal!'

I must confess that this idea had not occurred to me, and yet it was simple enough. As soon as the bottle was brought, my companion produced the green-sealed cork which I had found in the bedroom at Batignolles, and we immediately perceived that the wax was identical in shade and appearance with that on the cork of the cork that had just been served to us. Thus our moral certitude was reinforced by a material proof. As M. Méchinet had no intention of regaling M Victor with the bottle of wine he had ordered, we proceeded to imbibe its contents, and then recrossed the street and climbed the stairs of 'No. 23.' M. Méchinet gave a sharp rat-tat at Victor's door, and a voice with a pleasant ring immediately responded, 'Come in.'

The key was outside, and accordingly we opened the door. At a table, placed before the window of the room we entered, sat a man wearing a black blouse, and engaged in setting a stone in a gold ring. He was a fellow of thirty or thereabouts, tall and thin, with a pale face and black hair. He was scarcely handsome, but his features were fairly regular, and his eyes were not without expression. He seemed in no wise disconcerted by our visit.

'What do you desire, gentlemen?' he asked politely, at the same time turning round on his stool.

'In the name of the law, I arrest you!' exclaimed M. Méchinet, springing forward and catching the workman by the arm. Victor turned livid, but he did not lower his eyes.

'Don't play the fool,' he exclaimed, in an insolent tone. 'What have I done?'

M. Méchinet shrugged his shoulders.

'Come, no child's play, please,' said he; 'your account is settled. You were seen when you left the Rue de Lécluse at Batignolles, and in my pocket I've got the cork in which you planted your dagger so as to prevent the point from breaking.'

These words proved a crushing blow for the murderer, who, taken utterly by surprise, fell back against his table, stammering, 'I am innocent, I am innocent!'

'You can say that to the magistrate,' retorted M. Méchinet ; 'but I'm very much afraid that he won't believe you. Why, your accomplice, the woman Monistrol, has confessed everything.'

'That's impossible!' replied Victor, springing up as if he had been touched by an electric battery. 'She knew nothing about it.'

'Oh! so then you planned the little game by yourself, eh? All right. That confession will do to begin with.'

And turning towards me, with the air of a man who knows what he is about, M. Méchinet added: 'Please just search the drawers, M Godeuil. In one or another of them you will probably find this fine fellow's dagger, and I'm sure you'll light on his mistress's portrait and her love letters.'

Victor clenched his teeth with rage, and a gleam of fury shot from his dark eyes; but he no doubt realised that all resistance would be futile against a man of M. Méchinet's muscular build, endowed with such a pair of iron wrists. In a chest of drawers in one corner of the room I speedily found the dagger, the portrait, and the love letters, just as my companion had opined; and a quarter of an hour afterwards Victor had been securely stowed away in a cab between M. Méchinet and myself, and was rolling in the direction of the Prefecture de Police. The simplicity of the scene had well nigh stupefied me.

'And so,' I mused, 'that's how a murderer is arrested. What, is it no more difficult than that to secure the person of a man whose crime is punishable with death?'

But in later years I learnt at my own cost and peril that there are other criminals of a far more dangerous stamp. As for Victor, as soon as he found himself in a cell at the Dépôt, he gave himself up as lost, and made a most minute confession of his crime. He told us that, being one of Monistrol's friends, he had been acquainted with old M Pigoreau for several years. His main object in murdering him had been to designate Monistrol for the punishment of the law, and for this reason he had dressed himself like the jeweller, and had taken Pluto to Batignolles. As soon as the poor old man had ceased to live, he had seized him by the hand, dipped one of his fingers in the blood that flowed from the fatal wound, and traced on the floor those five letters, MONIS— the discovery of which had so nearly resulted in a deplorable judicial error.

'Ah! it was cleverly combined,' he added, with cynical effrontery; 'if I had only succeeded, I would have killed two birds with one stone. On the one hand, I got rid of that fool Monistrol, whom I hated, and I enriched the woman I loved. No doubt I might have persuaded her to live with me, after her husband had gone either to the scaffold or the galleys. But now—'

'Ah! my fine fellow!' retorted M. Méchinet; 'unfortunately for you, you lost your head at the last moment. But then, no one is perfect. When you traced those letters in blood on the floor, you made a terrible mistake, for you wrote them with one of the fingers of the old man's left hand.'

Victor sprung to his feet in astonishment. 'You don't mean to say that put you on my track?' he asked.

'Yes, I do.'

With the gesture of a man whose genius is misjudged, Victor raised his raised his arms to the ceiling.

'Ah!' said he; 'it's no use being an artist— no use remaining true to nature!' And, with a glance of mingled pity and contempt, he added: 'Don't you know that old M. Pigoreau was left-handed?'

He spoke the truth, as subsequent inquiries enabled me to ascertain. So thus, it was a mistake— a blunder perpetrated by myself— which, after all, had led us to the truth. The discovery, on which I had so particularly prided myself, was, in reality, none at all. And it was strange, indeed, that none of us had ever ventured to surmise that the little old man of Batignolles might have been in the habit of writing with his left hand. It is true that such cases are not very frequent— still they exist; but neither the magistrate nor the commissary, neither M. Méchinet nor his wife, had for one moment met my so-called discovery with such an objection— so true it is that the simplest things often escape our minds. However, the lesson was not lost to me, for I profited by it, with good result, on a subsequent occasion of my afterlife as a detective.

On the morrow, Monistrol was released from prison. The investigating magistrate reproached him in stringent terms, for having led justice astray; but he met all exhortations and reproaches with the same answer: 'I love my wife... I wished to sacrifice myself for her... I thought that she was guilty.'

He would say no more, but his conduct implied that he must have had some very serious grounds to believe in his wife's guilt. What could they have been? I decided, in my own mind, that Madame Clara must have previously tried to tempt her husband to commit this crime; but, although weak-minded, beyond a doubt, and passionately attached to her, he had nevertheless had the courage to resist her entreaties. Finding that her efforts were useless, she had, no doubt, turned to her lover, who proved to be of a more pliable character— especially when he was offered such a prize as wealth and undisputed possession of the woman he loved; for the latter contingency would, no doubt, have followed, had Monistrol been sent to the scaffold or the galleys.

It was in this manner that I explained the affair to myself. I could swear that Madame Monistrol was the instigator of the crime. And yet she escaped punishment. Juries do not content themselves with moral proof; and the discovery of her letters and her portrait in Victor's room, was not accounted sufficient evidence against her, when she appeared at the assizes by her lover's side. She was, moreover, defended by one of the most famous advocates of the Paris bar; and then, her tears, which flowed at will, no doubt, touched the hearts of her judges with compassion. Her charms, like those of Phyrné, might also have inspired them with a yet more tender sentiment. To be brief, she was acquitted; whilst Victor, in whose favour the jury saddled their verdict with an admission of 'extenuating circumstances', was sentenced to hard labour for life.

After giving such proof of his conjugal attachment, it is scarcely surprising that weak-minded M Monistrol should have taken his wife back to his home, if not entirely to his heart, when, after securing the benefit of a doubt, she was ordered to be set at liberty. As a matter of course, old M Pigoreau's fortune was handed over to the jeweller, but, with Madame Monistrol's extravagant tastes, it could not be expected to last long.

Nowadays, the Monistrols keep an ill-famed drinking den on the Cours de Vincennes, nigh the Place du Trone, and when the barrière bullies, who are their principal customers, are in good humour, they pay mocking court to the wife, now a corpulent woman, with a bloated face and a husky voice, and sadly addicted to brandy and absinthe. Her charms have fled long since, like old Anténor's money; and she and her weak-minded husband, whom she often beats in her fits of drunkenness, are swiftly descending the slope of degradation and misery.

—A. Casimir Godeuil

___________________________

Index to "Past Masters" stories, by author.

Issues 31-34

I never envisaged this series of original anthologies going into so many issues, and the ever-growing index to all issues was becoming unwieldy.  Accordingly, I have now divided the Index.  This Index commences with Past Masters 31.

The Index to Issues 1 to 30 can be found in Past Masters 30, or as a stand-alone document uploaded to the Kindle and Epub libraries at MobileRead.

The stories are arranged in Alphabetical order of Author's surname, or if the author's name is consistently a pseudonym, that pseudonym.  They are then in alphabetical order of title, disregarding "A", "An" and "The".

F. Anstey

The Talking Horse  34

Robert L. Ahern

Murder Needs No Motive  34

Anonymous

The Lady Detective's Story 32

Wolcott LeClear Beard

A Ledge of Safety 33

H Bedford-Jones

Apache Gold 31

The Devil's Fire 31

The Devil is Dead 31

The Fog at Fiddler's Green 31

The King's Pipe  34

Lady of the Evil Eye 31

Sons of Kalewa 31

C. Langton Clarke

The Detective for the Defense 33

Captain Dingle

Homeward Bound 33

Deferred 33

George Manville Fenn

Lady Florry's Gems  34

Francis Flagg

The Blue Dimension 33

The Heads of Apex 33

Emile Gaboriau

The Little Old Man of Batignolles

Guy Gilpatric

The Crafty Jerko-Slovaks 32

Headon Hill

Rogue's Legacy  32

S. B. H. Hurst

The Brightest Jewel of Them All 32

Charles J. Mansford

The Dervish of the Nile Pyramid 34

The Hidden Egyptian Shield  34

The Veiled Idol of Kor 32

The Great Dial of the Gold-Finders 33

Mrs. L. T. Meade

Beauty Dear 32

The Yellow Dragon Vases 32

Mrs L. T. Meade and Dr Clifford Halifax, M.D.

The Strange Case of Captain Gascoigne 31

With the Eternal Fires 32

The Small House on Steven's Heath 33

"To Every one His Own Fear"  34

Clarence Herbert New

The Attack from Moscow 32

The Island of Heaven and Hell 32

A Night in the Kremlin 34

The Secret of Banda Sea  34

Owen Oliver

A Pretty Woman 31

Max Pemberton

The Cripple at the Mill  34

Hugh Pendexter

It Might Have Happened Otherwise  32

Kingbird 33

The Raven Mocker 33

Lewis Ramsden

Désirée 32

Arthur Somers Roche

The Dayless Diamonds 32

A Flutter in Finance 32

"Illimore!" 31

The Premiere Danseuse 32

The Robbery at the Café Ravasan 31

The Victim of Amnesia 31

William Alexander Taylor

Intermere  33

F A M Webster

Towards Morning 33

Raoul Whitfield

The Caleso Murders 32

Rivals of the Clouds 31

Sinners' Paradise 33

William Alron Wolff

Bait, Hook and Sinker

_________________

Table of Contents

1: The King's Pipe / H. Bedford-Jones

2: "To Every one His Own Fear" /

3: The Cripple at the Mill / Max Pemberton

4: The Hidden Egyptian Shield / Charles J. Mansford

5: Lady Florry's Gems / George Manville Fenn

6: The Dervish of the Nile Pyramid / Charles J. Mansford

7: Murder Needs No Motive / Robert L. Ahern

8: The Talking Horse / F. Anstey

9: A Night in the Kremlin / Clarence Herbert New

10: Bait, Hook and Sinker / William Almon Wolff

11: The Secret of Banda Sea / Clarence Herbert New

12: The Little Old Man of Batignolles / Émile Gaboriau

Cumulative Index 31-34