HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1926-9-15, Page 7THE BRUSSELS POST
The Red
(Copyright) by MARY ROBERTS RINEHART
ea
8eSingiegeneild
"Then why didn't he sea Carta-
-way?"
"Search nu," he said, with a shrug
that set hint wiaeing. "What's both-
ering me is why doesn't anyhody sec
Carroway? Eight days, and no holy
found yet."
When 1 loft hint a few .minutes
ago, he had Edith's memory copy of
the paper found in the garage, and
was propped up in bed with a pencil.
"1f we had the original we'd be
'better off, he said. "It oughtn't to
be hard to find typewriter in the
vicinity that wrote it. And if Green-
nough isn't crazy with the heat Tae's
1oitkiatg for it now."
I glanced et my own portable
machine, sitting on the table. and he
followed my eyes and smiled.
• "You've got your best alibi right
flure," he said, -"if this turns out to
be a cipher. And I think it is."
Hr, has, St appear:,, some small
knowledge of ciphers, and front the
mixture, of capitals end small letters
tae believes he recognizes this one.
nut it require.: a key word, or two
key words.
Even without it," he says, ":t
could be solved, possibly, if 1 Mel
enough of it. But with only this
scrap—! And I don't get the number
.added to IL"
The idea of this type of cipher,i
gather, is to take a word or two
words containing thirteen letters of
the alphabet, no one used twice.
.written first in small or lower case
size these letters represent the first
thirteen letters of the alphabu'•. The
game word or words repeated in cap-
itals becomes the second half of tho
alphabet.
Thus the words "subnormal diet"
'become a key in this fashion:
subnormaldiet SUBNORMALDiI'iT
a b cdefghijklm n o f g r stuvwxyz
But as "subnormal diet" was the
only kap phrase we could tnink of,
and as it obviously did not fit, I left
Rim still biting the end of his pencil,
and came to complete this record.. .
Ronan said that the man who has
time to keep a private diary has never
understood the immensity of the uni-
verse. But I reply to Henan that the
man in my position, who does not
keep a private diary and thus let off
his surplus thoughts, is liable to burst
into minute fragments and scatter
over the said immensity of the uni-
verse!
Sunday, July 15th.
The one pleasure that never palls
is the pleasure of not going to church.
Again, as I recorded nnee before,
n quiet morning and I am still at
large. Jane has gone. Sometimes I
suspect Jane of throwing a sop to.
Providence in this matter of church-
going; almost, one might say, of bar-
gaining with the Almighty. "I will
'do thus and so," says Jane to her-
self, "anti in return I have a right to
ask thus and so."
Yet she asks little enough; a quiet
life, peace, and if not active happin-
ess, that resignation which after the
lot clays of youth are over, passes for
contentment. And, as she went oat
this morning, demurely dressed inietrhe
'Sabbatical restraint whieh is a part
ad Iter barglain, I felt rather oate said
a small prayer for her; theft she who
asks so little.'may keep wilt, at she has.
And Jane is worrie,& She knows
nothing, but site suseieets everything.
By that, I p1eal, to at she is somehow
award, after he 'own curious fashion,
that there i5,
her world ,y
am notA
•acid,
something wrong with
She watches me, when I
coking at her. She has an
her furtive, dislike of Doctor
iTty ward. And she is almost crimi••
i) 1y forwarding Edith's love affair,
Since Halliday was brought here
Zane and I have shared heti bedroom,
and this morning, buttoning my col-
lar, I said;
"The sooner that boy goes back to
-the boat -house, t he better."
"Why?" she demanded, almost ntfli
tantly,
Letterheads
Envelopes
Billheads
And all kinds of Business
Stationery printed at The
Post Publishing House.
W will athat ill
Wedo job w
do credit to your business.
Look over your stock of
Office Stationery and id' it
requires replenishing call
ins by telephone $1.
The Past Publishing g. g Nouse
"Well, if you c nn't cru whats go-
ing on under your eyes, my dear—"
"I don't 'seri why it shouldn't go on.
There'., not too inuch love in the
world."
"Nor enough bread and ,.cheese,"
"We didn't have very =eh when
we started, William,,' she eaid, look-
ing up at me wistfully.
"And we haven't much more now,"
I said, and kissed her.
But the plain truth is that Jane's
nerves are shaken. She Wants Edith
settled; she would like nothing better
than a spi,,,'!y marriage, if that would
take u:: back tel the city at once. All
her old hatred and distrust of this
place have been steadily reviving,
reviving, and -the attack on Hanley
has about eaten away her resistance,
All life is the resistance of an -un-
discoverable principle against un-
ceasing forces. And my poor Jane,
after years of protected life, is only
discovering' those unceasing forces.
Later: Poor Carroway's body has
been found. The tide was unusually
low at two this afternoon and a yawl
from Bass Cove, crossing the bay, saw
it floating face down, and recovered
it, not without difficulty. The poor
lad had been tied with the enc] of an
anchor rope, and the anchor thrown
over with him. Thus for days the
body had been only a few feet be-
neath the surface, boating at the end
of its tragic tether.
From the doctor, making his after-
noon call here, we heard the details.
He was summoned as seen as body
was brought in, and made a hasty ex`
amination. From that it appears that
Carroway was beaten over the head
first and then thrown into the, sea.
"He was probably dead before he
touched the water," is Hayward's
opinion. "Of course the autopsy will
tell that. If there is no water in
the middle ear or the lunge, we can
be certain.
But from Peter Geiss, who wan-
dered this afternoon after salvag-
ing certain of his personal possessions
from the sloop, we learned other
facts. Thus, Peter declares that the
man who killed Carroway was a sai-
lor, or at least knew how to use a
rope, sailor fashion.
And as Halliday said t.e ate, aside,
this was cheering news, For my best
friend could not accuse me of any
nautical knowledge.
The body, is seems, was tied with
two half-hitches around the wrist?;
from there the rope extended to the
ankle, with similar half-hitches, and
to these ends„ aga'n, t he anchor had
been affixed. S my query as to
whether such a pro,'eding would not
take considerable time Peter says
not.
"Two half-hitches is about the
quickest and easiest tie there ie," Inc
assures me, ,i4and the best to hold.
If it slips wee way it holds mother."
There ,4s, it seems to me, a cer-
tain resit in Peter's account of these
gruegeme details; a gusto in the tell-
inc. Like the ancient Greeks, Peter's
liesature is purely oral, and he has
by accident stumbled on en epic.
But the recovery of the body has
roused the enighborhood to _fever
heat. There have been those, up to
now, who have halfebelieved that Car-
roway had been the victim of an
accident; had somehow stumbled and
fallen overboard, and to- Drove this
they brought out the fact that, Like
many of the men on the waterside, he
could not swine.
There were others, too, who still in-
clined to the belief that some super-
natural influence had been at work;
that Carroway, indeed, had been the
victim of some, other -world focal play.
But even these supersitious folk can-
not now blame the red lamp. Carro-
way has been murdered, - by hands
whieh wielded the oar that struck
him, and which tied the half-hitches
which "if they slipped one way, held
the other."
The.anchor presents the only pos-
sible clue, and that is a feeble one,
On the other hand there is a sort of
half-hearted recognition of it by
Doctor Hayward as one stolen from
his small knock -about sometime late
in June.
"Of course, an these anchors are
as peas," he said this afternoon, "but
the boys Clown at the wharf say it's
mine, and they can till two flsh-hooks
apart, same !dee and same kind." .
The county authorities have finally
roused themselves and the Sheriff,
Benehley, is in Oakville, Under the
excuse of examining our float Green
-
nougt brought ion out, and Halliday
dressed and went with them to show
Where he had found tile' knife On
their return they stopped in and
looked at my car,
When IHalliday came back he was
grave and quiet. In vain slid Edith
try to coax him into lois usual light-
ltettrtednees. 'While T have no idea
as to what happened, I can make a
fair guess, for he announced at sun -
per that he was through playing the
i availd,
"It's time for me to he up and a-
bout," he ;aid. -
Ilenchley has increased the Coun-
ty's reward t o twenty-five hundred
dollars, and this with I.i ingteone's
makes throe thousand. As a result,
until twilight frightened them back
to their hearths, the vicinity was fill-
ed this afternoon with amateur de-
teetivc.e. Ar.ording to Annie. Coch-
ran,- one of them was sulking around
the hedge of the main house when Mr,
Bethel saw him and drove him of,
Just what that irritable and ex -
elusive gentleman makes of the sit -
tuition, I do not know. He must
have learned, through Gordon, of
our trouble here, but he makes no
sign. Now and then, but not often,
I sec him on the terrance, and if he
asknowledges my. finger to lay cap, T
rlo not see it.
He is so consistently unpleasant
that one must respect it, as consis-
tency of any sort is respected. . .
My own position is rather strength-
ened than weakened by to -day's de-
velopments, and I imagine Green-
ough himself is somewhat at sea. Not
only am 1 no sailor, andohvlously no
sailer, but I am not physically mus-
cular man. In the pursuits of Eng-
lish literature the wear and tear is on
trouser seats rather than on museles;
in ten years any one annual physical
orgy has been putting up the 'fly -
screens each April.
I could no more strangle a man
than I could bull -dog a steer.
Anc1, unless Greenough ds more be-
set with prejudices and. theory than
I think he is, he must know this. He
has, in addition, a slowly growinn list
of qualifications, all of which the
murderer must possess and a 1 ew of
which are mine. Thus:
The murderer is physically strong.
I nm not. The murderer (or at least
Halliday's assilant) wore a sort dark
hat, well pulled down. 1 h.ve lire
in the country a golf cap and a sum-
mer straw. Ne other. The mur-
derer had a sailor's knowledge of a
rope. I haven't the slightest know-
ledge of a rope, except that it is used
on Mondays to hang out the washing.
On only two points clo plead
guilty, and these with reservations.
For the murderer shows a knowledge
of the country -side, not only equal
to my own, but better. And Halli-
day says he got into the car as would
a man of middle life, rather than
youth. I am middle -aged, --if that
be not the next period just ahead
and never quite reached, until some
day we waken to find that he have
passed it in the night and are now
old, and taking an ingenuous pride
in that age.
July 15th.
I am facing an unusual quandary,
which is: shall I or shall I not attend
poor Carroway's funeral tomorrow?
What is the customary etiquette un-
der the circumstances. Does the
suspected agent of the death remain
decorously absent, -the only oat in
the entire neighborhood so missing?
Or, does he go, with a countenance
carefully set to show exactly the
polite amount of concern, and be sus-
pected as,the dog returning to his
vomit?
There is an old theory—I would
like to question Greenough about it,
if I dared—that your true murderer'
has an avid curiosity au to the work
of his hands! that, against all pru-
dence, he returns to it. Under these
circumstances, what shall 1' cls?
Compromise, probably, send more
fiower's than I can afford, and stay at
home, The same sort of compromise
which I effected with my soul yes-
terday, when I gave Jane a rather
larger amount ,than naval for the
collection plate. .
One of the reporters who has been
hanging around the vicinity since the
recovery of the body approached ane
today on a possible eonnoction be-
nt Halliday. I foun4 him coming
twean the murder and the attack
on Halliday. I found him coming
out of the garage, but as Greenough
had carefully erased the symbol on
the seat cushion, I doubt if he had
found anything valuable.
He pried me with polite questions,
but I evaded hint as wall as 1 could,
"But don't you, personally, believe
there is some connection?" Ise 111-
sisted.
"I should have to have sonic proof
of such a connection."
• "And you have none?" he asked,
eyeing me closely.
"I imagine you know at least as
much about it as I clo. Have you
found any?"
Perhaps rey attitude had annoyed
hint, or perhaps he merely had the
discoverer's pride fit achievement, for
he put away the handful of yeiloev
air, t
which lie had made o
no
>a
l 1 , on w t
notes, and smiled.
"1 haven't found any connection,"
he. said. "But T have found some-
thing year detectives missed, Mr,t
Porter. 1 have :found where the fele
low hid after the crash, when the
other car was reaming Mr, Haliday."
But the' odd part of that discovery
to my mind isnot that hiding )slate,
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• WANTED
• Ilighest market prices
paid.
• flee me or Phone No, 2x, liras.
• eels, and I will eall and get
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you,. liens.
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nor Greenough's failure to locate it.
As a matter o£ fact, I doubt if
Greenough has ever looked for it.
He seems to have taken for granted
that Halliday's assailant merely es-
caped the wreck and made off in the
dark.
No. The point that strikes tae, and
struck Halliday when I tolyl him is
the intimate knowledge of that loca-
tion shown, and the quickness with
which he took advantage of it.
(Note: In view of what we now
know, I intaeine this i$ an error. The
chances seen to be that he was
thrown near the mouth of the cul-
vert, and that the lights of the on-
coming car showed it to him.
Crossing the road, according to the
reporter, and about fifteen feet from
where t he car was ditched, is a small
culvert. Hardly a culvert, either, but
a largish clay pipe designed to carry
tier drainage of the higher fields on
one side to the lower on the, other.
"Have you searched this wipe?" I
asked.
"I looked in, If I'd had a pair of
overalls I'd have gone in, But as
the only clothes I have with me are
on me—" he smiled again. ''It's a
gond job for a ferret,' i:e said
He gave me up reluctantly, at hut,
and prepared to go.
"So you think .. s only an urdifury
case of hold-up?" he asked.
"I think it's a damned unpleasant
case of hold up," I replied, and he
went away. But I have been thinking
of his phrase since his departure.
How much of the present world
disorganization lies in that very use
of the word "ordinary!" Time was
when no hold-up was ordinary, and
an act of physical violence or a mur-
der caused a shock that swept us all.
It is true, then, that one cannot turn
the minds of a people to killing, as in
the recent war, and then expect them
at once, when the crisis is over, to
regard life as precious? And in this
the reason Greenough spoke 02 its
being a "queer time in the world?"
Is every criminal then merely seek-
ingesea a fromreality?
p y
But why the word "criminal"?
Was not I myself seeking to escape
it, when on June 16th 'wrote in this
very Journal:
"Yet what is it that I want? My
little rut is comfortable; so long have
I lain in it that now my very body
has conformed."
For the rest of this afternoon, 1
have made my will! "To my dearly
beloved wife, Janie Porter, I bequeath
etc."
There is something strangely com-
forting in making a will; it is as if
one has completed the last rites, and
now, with such complacence as may
be, faces whatever is to coins. Like
Ishmael in "Moby Dick," I survive
myself; my death and burial are
locked up in my desk. I am "like a
quiet ghost with a clear conscience,
sitting inside the bars of a snug fam-
ily vault"
A ghost, too, I begin to feel, a-
mong other ghosts. . . .
Ignore it as 1 will, there is a cer-
tain weight in the slowly aecumulat-
iny mass of evidence at my disposal,
a weight and a consistency which
have commenced toinfluence me. I
am bound to admit that, if I were
able to conceive of the survival of
intelligence beyond death, I could
also conceive that poor old Horace
has been on hand during some of
our recent experiences.
Not Thomas's "George," the spirit
evoked by Mrs. Riggs and still sur-
viving in the lamp; stet some mali—
cious demon, frightening honest folk
by ringing bells and pinching women
in the dark. But a mind like my own,
only greater in its wider knowledge,
and painfully trying, in its bodiless
state to communicate that knowledge
to ate.
The sunt total of evidence is rather
startling. ,
(a) Jane's photograph, taken of
Class Day.
(b) Jock',s refusal to enter the
main house, persisted in to this time.
(c) My own curious telepathic mes-
sage, relative to the letter,
rd under the
neenre
(d ) Ja s rxa It
sed lamp in thin pantry. , (Doubt.
fol,)
(e) Hallitlay'c lights ever the
marsh. (Again doubtful. It may
have been the unknown, finding the
boat -house occupied end seeking a
way to the beach,)
(1) My own experience in hearing
Uncle Hoarce's peculiar cough And
1 '
smelling the odor of his asthmati.'
pastilles,c he >
r c f.,uruttus.
(g) Jock's peculiar conduct at the
same time.
(h) Peter Calm's ri don on the
;loop, and his idrmtification •of
(Y c e Peter 15 a staunch supporter of
"George." Had he been looking for
such a visitation would he not na-
turally have seen George?) •
(i) And the fact that this vi !en
corresponds in time with the attack
on Holliday.
In this -attempt to re£rcnh my
memory I have not included Jan's
premonition the night Carroway was
murdered, or her dislike and distrust
of the house. Nor have I included
the vague stories of haunting told
by Mrs. Livingstone, Annie Cochran
or Thetas. Of the latter, they are
not only beyond my personal experi-
cnec or contact, but they are, if the
word may be used in such a con-
nection, apparently without motive.
With Jane, too, I feel that a far•
ulty which enabled her to rise 1,t the
morning without seeing her clock,
may be -extended further- without
touching the supernatural. I gran;
her a strange power, possessed doubt-
less by many criminals and a few
human beings, of being able to see
and hear what cannot be seen and
heard by normal eyes and ears. But
as I grant this some faculty to Jock,
it seems to me to be rather a question
of ordinary limitations than of a
peep -hole, as I may put it, into an-
other world.
On the other hand, I must not dis-
regard the fact that Jane seems an
essential part of the phenomena which
I have recorded. On the two oc-
casions when I have had the strong-
est impression, of some disembodied
presence, she has been asleep near-
by. In the case of the photograph,
it was Jane who operated the cam-
era; in the pantry of the main
house, it was Jane who saw the face
behind her, reflected in the window.
And so on.
I am driven to wondering if, in
some states, Jane herself does not
provide the medium for these mani-
festations. Whether she does not
thrown off some excess of vital mat-
ter, in which the poor naked and dis-
embodied intelligence may clothe it-
self.
But that is to accept the whole
WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 16th, 102G.
theory of spiritism, and I am not
prepared to do that; to travel with
Cameron and little Pettingill, weigh-
ing,the dying with the one and elaim-
ing that the purely chemical loss of
weight is the weight of the • sti;; and
. sttbng in the dark with the other,
asking non physical intelligences to
commit various phymire d acts!! Putt-
ing their belief in eternity into the
.rasping hands of a pa!•I m'.+diunt,
and seeing Clod in the pulling of a
black thread.
Which reminds ma of an anaaasing-
eonversatian at luncheon today, Hnl-
liday's last meal with us before re-
turning to the boat -house.
"What beeomee of all the med-
lums?" Edith asked suddenly, apro-
pos of nothing at all.
"What become,, of all the hairpins,
and dead birds'?" I asked, not toe
nriginaily.
"But it Le queer," she persisted.
These women come and make a fur-
ore. Then all at once they disap-
pear."
"They get discovered and than
quit," Halliday said. "And of
course, even a medium must •die in
time. Not that they actually die, of
course. They simply go into the
fourth dimension.
"And what's the fourth dimen-
sion ?"
"Why, don't you know?" he asked.
"The simplest thing in the world.. It's
the cube of a cube. And once you
get into it you can turn yourself in-
side out like a glove. Not that I
see any particular use in that; but it
might be interesting."
Edith, it appears, intends to write
an article on mediums!
July 17th.
I do not like young Gordon. He
has little enough time to hiucsclf—
dniy, I gather, an hour or so after
• luncheon, while Mr. Bethel sleeps—
but he spends that here, if possible.
Edith snubs him, but he is as thick
,1-:...1..0 n5 AAre,aflCeb9n-• hremoi3Y•Q
which rolls itself in the bay.
; "Why, if you've so clever," I over
heard her today, "don't you go out
and ado something? Use your brains."
"It takes brains to do what I'm do-
ing," he said, "and don't you forget
it."
But as to what he is doing he is
discreetly silent. There is a hook
under way, but he parries any at-
tempt to discuss it, Also, he seems
to delight in investing Mr. Bethel
wish a considerable amount o%' my-
stery,
"Thr Bass is having one of his Fite
today," he will ray.
"What sort of fits?"
"That would be telling.," ho eaay.a
craftily, and ostentatiously changes
the subject,
(To Be Continued).
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The Industrial Moragago
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AlkAax g. Iia e11 tldk"&°
AGENT FOR
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GPM PAN FES
For Brussels and vicinity Phone 64
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Also
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PRICES MODERATE
iPer reterenees consult any person whose 85195
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T. T. M' RAE
M. a.. M• C- P., O S. O.
M. O. EL, Village of Brussels.
Physician. iinrgenn. Acm+uelreer
Mee ail residence, opposite Melville Church.
William street.
1r. N. SzA'mof3P
BARRISTER, SOLICITOR,
CONVEYANCER, NOTARY PUBLIC
LECKIE BLOCK • •BRUSSELS
DR, WARDL.AW
Honor graduate Ot the Oatarto Veterina y
College. Day and night Delia. 0>$oe oDPosite
li'ienr Mill, Ethel,
A
.IYmJ's r ,as,
ri 1iengtaniC)jC nt(Jiii li,( iif )a; ()
....:...u.w,a.,,:«..:-. -i.
Time's
ash
Vaue
Modern methods and appliances have set a new
standard for a day's work. Time is one big factor.
This is true in the factory, on the farm, in the home
or what not.
Time is money to -day, And anything that mul-
tiplies the value of an hour is increasingly valuable.
Advertising is an annihilator of time. It pro-
vides a short cut between a manufacturer or mer-
chant and you. It makes it possible to tell in a few
minutes all you want to know about the services or
articles you need.
A quick glance through THE BRUSSELS POST en-
ables you to sift the things that interest you, and in a min-
ute you can know just where and when to go for what you
want.
Figure out how much valuable time advertising saves
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Yes, Advertising; has a Big Value
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0
THE BRU5S[L5 POST, e
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