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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1926-11-17, Page 7THE BRUSSELS POST 2er:eerie*, ; ffikOMSPiegft.1.10111WIN.IslikAs000104.1 The Red Lam (Copyright) by MARY ROBERTS RINEHART se. — • question is, whet would Cameron ' say? Not for him the amorous Had- ly in the chutehyard—a spot, by the ; way, if our spiritists are right, not quite so exclusive as Hadly seems to have consiaered it—nor a ten -kettle ,moving about, His the coldly scien- tific method; the medium in a box, tied hand and foot; scales of weigh- in; cameras; note -books, witneeees. Not for him Pettingill'e wide View into, eternity, but a. narrow slit, guarded by little bells on strings, through which the poor 'ghost' must creep if he come at all. I wonder what would happen if I could. Induce him to COMO here? Evanston, 'BMW. August 12, 1022. "Dear Madam; "I have read with esret interest your account of the strange occurs pence at the light -house at Robin- son's Point, and would like to tell you of something which occurred here that same night and, allowing roe the diffetence in time, at about the same hour. "I am not a spiritualist, bet fol- lowing- a small dine& here, it was suggested that we try table levitation and against my husband's protests, this was arranged for. "lily husband, I may say, ie not psychic in any way, and was greatly bored with the proceeding. We were not surprised, therefore, when after sitting in darkness for ten minutes or so, he fell asleep and began to breathe heavily. "I tried to rouse him but was un- able to, when the opinion was given that he was in a trance state. As none of us were familiar with that condi- tion, and as he continued 'co breathe heavily, I was greatly alarmed. There was a doctor in the party, however, • and on his saying that his pulse was all right, we sat quiet and waited, "He than seed 'Jane, Jane" in an agonized voice, and as my name is not. Jane there was some amuse:men; especially when he added. "She is asleep. I cannot rouse her.' Almost immediately after that, howeyee, he said 'llobitison'i Point' and eome,thing about a boat there. (We think now that the allusion may have been to the light -house you mention.) After that he was (riot for a time and 1 begged to. be allowed to waken him, but just as we had turned on the lights again he got up, with his eyes still dosed, 62nel leaning over the tab- le, seemed to be staring at the gen- tleman across from hien. (A. Mr. Lewis, a very nice man, with whom my husband plays golf a great deal.) 4 'I have not changed my attitude;' he said, in a really terrible voice: 'I repudiate you and all your works. T am not afraid of you. The thing is monstrous, and society should be warned against you.' "I have forgotten to say that he kept his right hand closed, as though he had something in it. He niacin a geseure at though he threw this scnitething away, and then locked at Mr. Lewis again and said, have warned you; I shall tell the police.' I "Ile seemed to be in a state of great excitment, and hardly able eo breathe. He fell back intd the chair and our doctor friend reached ever and felt his pulse. He says now, that although his heart is perfectly sound, et had almost stopped. In- deed, he would have fallen had the doctor not caught him. In a sheet time he came around andseemed to think he had been asleep. He felt, however, very wretched the next day, ' "This may not interest you, but the mention of Robinson's Point in your article, and the similarity in time, has struck ma as a strange co- incidence. I am sigrting this in full, as an evideece of good faith, but I must ask you not to use et far publi- cation." (Note: I have since sceured the writer's consent to the use of this letter, on condition that 1 withohl the signature.) "An element -which works beyond says Browning. A poet's idea only, Our guess; Soul, the unsounded see," I perhaps, but wasn't it Montaigne who said that all our philosophy is but sophisticated poetry? What a joyous time little Pettin- gill would have with all this. Trot- ting about, a note -book in hand, add- ing up a glimpse here, a look them until he had a complete penoramie view of all eternity. But the real 1.••••••••••00.00.111•1=2, Letterheads Envehes Billheads And all kinds of Business Stationery printed at Thcl Post Publishing HoUse. We will do a job that will do credit to your business, Look over your stock of 011ie° Stationery and if it requires repletishittg call us by telephone 81. The Poet Publishing NO1180 August 171h, One lives and learns. • eVtr. Bethel last night lifted a small corner of the mystery and showed me a few of the wheels within. 'With the net result that we are where we were before. . , He telephoned me at nine o'clock last night, the first time I have known him to use tho telephone, and asked me to see him. - (Note: I have, 1 think, not mea- tioned, that the three buildings, the Lodge, main house and boathouse, are on one telephdne. As this :fact plays an important part latest on, ,it requires explanation.) I found him alone in the library, but with certain .changes from the last time 1 had seen him thus. The windows were closed and locked, and the heavy curtains diaven across them; both the rear and feont doors in the hall were bolted, enci when T was finally obliged to ring, I could hear the old man dragging himself slowly into the hall and there stop- ping. "Who is it?" he calla 1. "Porter." 1 was on the terrace, end he open- ed the door for me, workng laborioue- ly with his single useful hand. Once inside, he left me to close it for my- self, and went back Int) the library. When I followed him it was to find him seated, with the revolver close eV hand as before. He was a strange, half-einister figure as he eat there, but when he spoke it Ives as the querulous invalid of our first meet- ing. "I don't like your house, Mee Pew- ter," he barked at me, 'without pro- ne naey. "I don't like it myself," I admit- ted. "I am thinking of adding to the insurance and then setting a match to it. After you are out,of course," I added. That brought a sort of dry chuckle from him, but the next moment he was back to the attack. He supposed he was responsible for the balance , of the rent, but, wasn't r morally sponsible if he couldn't live here? I had known the stories, tbout the house, and yet had let It to him. There was a question there, "There is no question," I said. "1 have no idea of holding you up for the balance of the rent." ' It seemed to me, however, that he hardly heard ma. ke was listening again, as he had before,' and when he spoke it was an e. totally different matter. "Yoe find me rather on guard," be said. "I am alone ill the, house." "Where's Gordon?"„ "He went into the city this 'morn- ing. Ile has not come back." And there was something in the way he made the statemeet that caused me to look at him quickly. "You mean that he has gone foe good?" "No, I wish to God he had." There was fear in that, and I re- alized than that all the place showed fear, the locked and bolted house, the dine light—only one lamp going, and that on the desk—the revolver, and the old Man's twisted body, crouch- ed and watchful. "I am afraid of him, Mr. Pewter," he said. "I think isa ree.ans to hill me." "Nonsense I" "I wish it Were." "Cah't you get rid of him?" "Don't you suppose I've tried?" His story, if stole/ it, can be called, that rambling disceurse broken into by hie fits of listening, even once of sending me out to take a look around, is as. follows: He had picked Abe boy up 10 the city, knowing little or nothing about him. and from the time they meted he had not quite trusted him. After thineetoo, he began to stispoet that lie was getting Out o,f the house at night, and poeeibly using the eine "Not Meaty in itself, perhaps," Isa said, "but it left -me Mena :tor one thing, Atid it is not a libuee- in Which one etteett to .he Alone," glerwed at trio, "And feet another,—Well, I needn't tell you what has been going on." Bet he Was not, t drrt, raIly 81v., eieious of these night ex,•ureione, :nye for his reeentment at beleg left there, alone and heiplc•ss with a le•ller loose in the neighborhood, He kept 21, watch, therefore, not so much over the boy as over the house and him- self In his absence. "If he left a door or window open" he said, "I was at the mercy of any- body who chose to enter," And this, ha says, was the Mims - tion on the night of the 26th of July. I -To had gone to the boy's room and found it empty, and had aft,' some debate decided to work his way downstairs and lock him out. "And myself in," he said. It took him a long time to do it; he says too that he was very ner- vous; there were sounds, especially in the dining room, Nothing he could account for, but they upset him still further, and by the time he reached the kitchen he was le a bad way. lie had to sit down there. - It was while he was sitting there that he heard sounds on the poreh, and somebody at the door. From that on he says he was beyond coh- erent thinking, but he had no doubt in the world, because of the stealth- iness of the movement, that the thing he had feared was happenine. It seems never to have occurred to him that it was Gordon. He dragged himself to the stove, found the poker, and as the door opened struck with all his strength. "It was only when he made a leap for the bell that I knew what I had done." He was stricken. He felt the boy's pulse and knew he was not dead, but off somewhere near the sun -dial he heard some one moving, end that al- armed him still more. "A man never knows his coward - icer he said wryly, "until h • is net to the test. I have very, little Idea of what I did. next; my only clear recollection is of finding myself in my room. I don't remember getting there." But—and this is the point—the boy suspected him. He was suite of it. There had been a complete change in his attitude eines that time. And watching that change, studying Gordon as he had felt ob- liged to, he had felt that someehing underlay all this. In other words, gradually he had begun to associate the boy with the other crimes. "He is weak," he said, "weak end vicious. And there is that curious mental state called identification; the weak see the crimes committed by the strong, admire them, admire the criminal. Then they begin to ape them, as Gordon tray have aped your sheep -killer, finally even identifying himself with this unknown, adoptieg his symbol, or whatever one chooses to call it." I listened carefully, trying, to fit this new light on Gordon'a injury with the evidence' as I knew it. True, the weak link in ow: chain against him had been that he himself had been attacked. And this was now solved M a perfectly mattee-of-faut manner, But there was some dis- crepancy there, something which eluded me until I lw,d gone over in my mind the events of the night of the 26th in their sequence. Then I found it. "But what about the man the boy saw enter by the gun rom window?" "Pure invention, I feel certain. Had he accused me lie knew the nine. ter of his night excursions would eome out. That was the last thing he wanted," , It was my next remark, however, which has left us, as I wrote at the beginning of this entry, jest where we were before. "You haven't said anything; about Itliacy:_, tope,, hie. Bethel. That has el- y"Roper ho said slowly. "What rope?" "He was tied hand ass a foot when I found him." ITo glaimed at me, and then deem at Isis helpless hand. "TVs a very long time eince 1 have been able to tio a rope, Mr. Porter," he said goietly. 1 eemained with hiin until ett hour or so after the last train from the city had arrived, but there WU to sign of Gordon. I offered to remaiti for the night with him, but he de- clined. He would not go to bed, however, and 1 left him that% at last, his revolver within reach Of that later talk there ict on) mat - tor 4f teal importance to record, T have a strange pieture in mins', bowleg on the relations of thotse. two, the old mail and the boy, and leading up to it; each watching the other, the old elan *reified, the boy deadly. And on the surface, before .Annie COCItratl, all well aaough between there; (-Relation taken, end the book groivieg. &tall surface differouces, peithaps, but undernetith euepielon osl 0116 side erist eeVenge Atill hated on Us Othee. 4+.444.**4114.4.4+.4,04,40.0+0÷‘÷ t I 4. 9 + , E . , + + O 4 ÷ ., , • WANTED • • • • - • to Highest market + prices el • paid: 1 Bee ma or Phone ND). 2x, Bros- sek, and 1 will nall fli)(1 get, +, t 4. $011,. freit, : M, Yollick I . t .......,............,,....., Then Gordon toolto locking hie room. It was Annie Cochran who told Bethel, and from that time on that locked room played its own part between them; the old rnan asking himself what vele hidden In it, the secrtary with his sneering mile quiet- ly carrying the key. /1 grew, I gath- ered, to have a peculiar place in the Old man's imagination; he wandered down the passage more than °nee; finally Annie Cochran caught him there, trying the knob, end he heel made some 'excuse and gone away. But...the night young Gordon flung out of the hduse, the same night 1 saw the figure at the foot of the stairs, Annie Cochran had come to bin, before leaving, with a key in her hand. "I thought you might like this, sir," she said. "I find it fits Mr. Gordon's door." Then she had gone, and he What to the nom and entered it. The knife and the rope were thereand he took them. "What was I to say Vett night, when the constable came down and repoeted nothing there? In ten min- utes, or an hour, you were going to leave me here with him. He was trephine me; be knew." And I daresay lu• was right, No matter what statement had been made relative to the rope and the knife, there was no reason for Gor- don's arrest that night. In ten min- utes, or an hour, they would have been left together, and who knows what might have happened? August 18th. Gordon came back °ally this morn- ing-. I invented an errand to the house soon after breakfavt, but found that Mr. Bethel was still sleep- ing—as even he might ---and that preparations for to-morogiv'e depart - tare were- well under way. While Gordon was busy on the lower floor, Thomas and I made a tour of the house, with a view to closing it. I have inetructee him to paint and put up the window boards 'Which close he windows on the lower floor; I shall know no peace' until the place Is sealed, and left to its demons or its ghosts. But I took advantage of my legiti- mate presence on he upper floor to examine the locked closet in which I had stored the red lamp. It is still there, and apparently has not been disturbed Halliday to -clay advised or nee a period of masterly inactivity. Not that he calls it so, but that is what he means. "I have an idea, Skipper," he said, "that this calling Greenough off the case was sheer bluff, Every move ha raade was being watched, and unless I miss tny guess you'll and lie's at Bass Cove, or some place nearby, un- der another name. I thought I saw Isis Ford a night or so ago." What I finally gathered 13 that Hal- liday wants to eliminate ine from the case, for my own sake. "just now," he said, "you are sit- ting Italy pretty. But one more bit of bad luck and he's ready to jump." Although he smiled, I Have an idea he is deadly serious; thee he knows Greenough is not far away, end that ear smug unknown reason he expects another bit of bad beck. His face is thin and haggard these days, awl 'from the fact that he sleeps a great deal in the daytime, I am inclined to think that he sleeps very little at night. Between him and Edith, too, I sur- mise sonic sort of mysterious under- standing. At the same time, there is 11 noticeable, absence of those three -angled coeferences isi tvhich, some little time ago, we wore free to air our various theories. Wilty hilly, I ant consigned to in- nocuous desuetude. Hayward stated yesterday on hie vacation. e August 2011e 4100 A.M. Mr. Bethel was murder- ed betweoh eleven o'clock and mid- night last night. Gordon lute escap- ed. . 7:00 AM inne is at last taloop, and T have .had some coffee. Per- haps if I rhord the evente of the eight it, wli/quiet me, After all, one mina fo et such things; tho only possible c utse is to bring them 'to the stain s, to eaco them 't Vlnot face thet repel, WEDNESDAY, NOV. 17, 1826, Murder. The very word is cell. But no onc• has ever known how evil until he has seen it. Such thing's (•annot be written; they •cheuld not he seen. They should not be. We have had this murder. We have gone over ineh hy inch, the scene of it. We have been ;spared no ehock; the evidence of the strug- tele ie on the walls, the door, the furniture; we have the very knife with which it was committed. We have .even gone further than that. We have followed it outside, along tee drive to the garage, and from there by the car to the salt mareli beyond Robinson's Point. And yet, according to Halliday, until we have gone further, we have 1121(1 no murder, according to the law. Ever since daylight, I have been struggling to see the -justice of a lave where, when Gordon is found— eine Greenough believes he will be found—we cannot eonvict him unlese we also find that bit of' old flesh and blood arid bone which was once Sim- on I3ethel. Is it only necessary, to escape jus- tice, that a criminal artfully dispose of hie crime? And by how narrow • a margin he did escape it! A matter of minutes. Between my calling Halides, on the telephone and my meeting him at the terrace; perhaps even between that and our entrance into that wrecked mom A matter of -minutes. In one thing only did he make an error, and even that rnay not have been an error. He may coolly have abandoned his suiteas-3, peeked and hidden in the shrubbery; may have stood there a second or so, consider- ing it, and then decided to let it lie. The most ggievous thing to me is that I should have given him the warning. And the most terrible pic- ture I have is that, when I called tut good Betel -deg In 55 the telephoue, craftily cals.:ageing: "Can I make it? Can I not?" With that behind him. . . . Crafty, As old in crime as crime is old for .all his youth. Out on the bay disposing g his horrible freight, and watching the lanterns as they searched for the boat; seeing them scatter, looking for other boats 'with which to follow him out onto the water, and then quietly heading back into the creek again, anti escaping through the wood. Crafty, beyond words. Auguet 21st. The exeitement le still intense. 1 have hardly seen Halliday since our trouble; he is working with the poi ice, of which a number have come te assist Greenough. Curiou5 crowds stand outside our gat,' l whirls we have been obliged to close end lock. A few of the more adventureue, gaining admission by the lane, are turned back there by guards who are on duty day and night. Thomas, standing at the gate, has orders to admit only the detectives and duly accredited members of the press. • On thp bay we have onee more the familiar crowd of seorching boate. Off the Point, draggine- has been going on, but with no emit. Owing to the fact that no gear& were placed by the boat, a large por- tion of it has already been taken away by morbid individuals who will place their trophies, I dareeity, on tables or mantel -pieces, and there- after gloat over them. Truly, just as the lunatie always insiste that he is sane, s9 do the sane often demonstrate that they are mad. And so far, nothing. Nothing, that is, which leads to Gorclon's apprehension. From the time he turned back in the boat and landing, made his escape into the woods above Robinson's Point, he disappeared entirely. Here and ;here a clue has turned up, to end in dis- appointment. Greenough believes that he will be found, that he cannot escape the police drag -net, but I am not so sure. . . . Although almost forty-eight hours have passed, Jane has not yet open - ''5 the :411.I., -t Of th t-lf•nhuri end because of her morbid reserve on such matters, I have not told the police. Asked how I happened to be at the telephone and thus receive the alarm, I have replied that the bell I rang, that I went to the instrument, and was immediately aware that one ' of the receivers was down, either at Halliday's or at the main house. 1 (To Be (Jontinued), streee lights in A 2 weed were turned nu, on Sato y g b t, mid bite eitizens are ere icing ley the ire - prevenient, made to the atr els of the village, ROSINESS GAMS mrHE industrial Mortgage and Savings Company, of Sarnia Ontario, are prepared to advanoe money on Mortgage, on gm.d lands. Flartioa desiring money on farm mortgages will phsae apply Do James Cowan, ..eaforth, Ont., who will fur nish rates and other particulars. Tho Industrial mortgage and Savings Company C. C. RAMAGE, D.D.S., BRUSSELS, ONT. Graduate Royal College of Dental Surgeons and Honor Graduate Uni- versity of Toronto. Dentistry in ail Its branches. Office Over Standard Bank, Phone 200 44,IV Lkaagav AGENT FOR Fire, Automobile and Wind Ins. COMPANIES for Brussels and vicinity Phone 647 JAMES M"FADZEAAI Agent Hoick Mutual fire insurance Comm Also Hartford Windstorm and Tornado Insurance Phone 42 Box 1 Turnberry street. Brussel. MO. SUTHERLAND & SON LIMITED 1,X.SEIER.VC14 416111ZPIF eXTSAJO D. M. SCOTT Lizums= droztre.vart PRICES MODERATE Por references consult any Person whose sale, I have officiated at. Phone 2226 r. T. AVRAE m. B., wt. D. P., S. O. M. 0. B., Village) of Brussels. Phystotatt, Surgeon, Aocouolieur Office at residenoe. opposite Melville Church. William street. W. X. Soras.trzgt BARRISTER, SOLICITOR, CONVEYANCER, NOTARY PUBLIC LECKIE BLOCK - 'BRUSSELS OR. WARDLAW Honor graduate of the Ontario Veterinsr7 College. Dar and night calls. Oftloe opposit's pion? 3801, Bthel. dikiraigtriffIgla !est a 6 40' '‘ICt i'ecisatio zikir:lairtg)fr' '77 Onifin r41741(446170 -ii 6.1 Worth Selling is Worth Telling Advertise Advertise what you are doing. Advertise what you expect to do. Advertise your old goods and move them. Advertise your new goods and sell them before they get old. Advertise to hold old trade. Advertise to get new trade. Advertise when business is good to make it better. Advertise when business is poor to !keep it from getting worse, Advertising is not a "cure-all," Advertising is a preventative. Advertising does not push, it pulls. Advertising to pay must be consistent and persistent, do 6 exciafik-415:(0441. -041wroingv, Ac,r)49,Ettac, 1, , 'Tim,