" QUICK AS A FLASH THE THOUGHT RUSHED ACROSS HER MIND OF PEOPLE 
 ATTEMPTING TO ROB THE BANK."
 
 THE 
 
 POMFRET MYSTERY, 
 
 A NOVEL OF INCIDENT, 
 
 ARTHUR DUDLEY VINTON. 
 
 "3- am a plain, blunt man 3 onlg speafc rigbt on." 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 
 J. S. OGILVIE & COMPANY, 
 31 ROSE STREET.
 
 Copyright, 1886, 
 By J. S. OGILVEE & CO.
 
 DEDICA TION. 
 
 TO THE 
 
 f tlxs gitcravtj 
 
 AND 
 
 THOSE OTHER FRIENDS, WHOSE LITERARY ADVICE AND CRITICISM 
 
 HAVE SO MATERIALLY AIDED ME IN MY ATTEMPTS AT AUTHOR 
 
 SHIP, THIS BOOK IS GRATEFULLY DEDICATED. 
 
 ARTHUR DUDLEY VINTOX. 
 
 NEW YORK, 1886. 
 
 2072892
 
 As the busy bee, which sips 
 Honey from each flower, 
 In the honeysuckle dips, 
 Tastes the clover for an hour, 
 Hides among the roses' lips, 
 Hums around my .lady's bower 
 As the bee sips, so I've read 
 Much that modern writers said; 
 Many thoughts, of authors olden, 
 fresh, original and golden. 
 Some of these Time did efface, 
 Some my memory cannot trace, 
 But full many yet remain 
 In the mazes of my brain, 
 And from thence may sometimes flit 
 As original with it. 
 Erring memory oft has told 
 Things as novel which were old.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THE POMFEET MYSTEBY is only what it pretends to be 
 a Novel of Incident in which the reader will find much 
 that interests and amuses. 
 
 The story was written to entertain, and instruction was a 
 secondary desideratum ; but there may be some bits of 
 wisdom on these pages which will cause the reader to think 
 that the story is well worth a perusal. 
 
 With this introduction the author commits the book 
 to the world, trusting that it will meet with all the success 
 which he wishes for it. 
 
 ARTHUR DUDLEY VINTON. 
 
 NEW YORK, JANUARY, 1886.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Chapter I. ARCHIBALD MORROW, .... 9 
 
 " II A BIT OF HISTORY, .... 12 
 
 " III. MORE HISTORY, 22 
 
 " IV. A CHANGE OP IDENTITIES, . - . . 26 
 
 " V. A GAMBLER, 30 
 
 " VI. POMFRET, 37 
 
 " VII. AN ASSIGNATION, 43 
 
 " VTII. ARTHUR VANCE, 49 
 
 " IX. LALINE, 58 
 
 " X. WHAT ETHEL SAW, .... 80 
 
 " XI. A MYSTERIOUS MURDER, ... 87 
 
 XII. BENNY'S DREAM, 91 
 
 " XIII. NEWS OF THE ROBBERY, .... 99 
 
 " XIV. ANOTHER LETTER, .... 105 
 
 " XV. ONE MORE LETTER, . . . . 117 
 
 XVI. A CLUE 123 
 
 XVII. THE TRIAL, 131 
 
 " XVIIL ETHEL'S ILLNESS, . . .- . . 137 
 
 " XIX. DETECTIVE WORK, 145 
 
 " XX. FOUND AND LOST, .... 154 
 
 " XXI. A CONFESSION, 159 
 
 " XXII. THE RED FARM HOUSE, . ... 166 
 
 " XXIIL DYING, 174 
 
 " XXIV. HOME AGAIN, . . ... 180 
 
 " XXV. RESTLESSNESS, 185 
 
 " XXVI. AUNT MARTHA'S ROMANCE, ... 189 
 
 " XXVII. CHARLOTTE, 209 
 
 " XXVIIL A STRANGE DISEASE, .... 215 
 
 " XXIX. SKEINS UNTANGLED, .... 225 
 
 ' XXX. THE END, 231
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 ARCHIBALD MORROW. 
 
 THE time was many years ago; the place was a little red 
 farmhouse on the slope of a Kentucky hillside. 
 
 Farmer Morrow, his wife and his only sou, sat in the low- 
 studded room of this farmhouse engaged in their several 
 vocations. John Morrow, a fine, tall, strong-limbed man, 
 sat reading the Bible, which rested on the table beneath 
 the light of the candles which burned above it in the antique 
 candlesticks. As he bent over the pages the massive arms 
 and breadth of shoulder which he displayed betokened a 
 frame of more than ordinary muscular strength, while the 
 streaks of gray in his hair and beard, betokened that age 
 was slowly creeping upon him. By his side sat his wife, a 
 woman younger in years than he, whose form had rounded 
 out as the years of her womanhood had slipped by, but from 
 whose face Time had not been able to erase all the traces of 
 girlish beauty. Her deft fingers rapidly plied the knitting 
 needles and wove the colored yarn in and out as row after 
 row of stitches were clicked away. From time to time her 
 loving glances rested peacefully on husband and son, and 
 then her eyes fell, to count her stitches or turn a corner. 
 
 The boy, whose age might have been some fifteen years, 
 bent over a drawing book, pencil in hand, giving the finish,-
 
 10 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 ing touches to some sketch which he had made the day 
 before, while ever and anon his left hand brushed away the 
 long locks of his curly, brown hair, which fell in tangled 
 masses from his head and shaded the paper from the candle- 
 light. 
 
 It was a wild night outside. The wind was racing down 
 the hillside and across the valley, pausing for an instant 
 to shriek and scream at the old farmhouse, to rattle its doors 
 and windows and to bellow down the huge-throated old 
 chimney. But the chimney had had many a previous tussle 
 with the wind, and now it stood unmoved with its wide 
 mouth gathering in all the sounds of the night, the sough- 
 ing of the trees as the wind rushed through their sapless 
 boughs, the rustling of the dead leaves as the breeze tossed 
 them about or drove them like flocks of night birds before 
 him. 
 
 It was the first cold night of early winter, and a bright 
 fire blazed and crackled on the hearth and sent up thin curls 
 of smoke and clouds of warm air and jets of steam from the 
 sappy wood. What matter if the night was inclement out- 
 side when all was warm and bright within the room ? 
 
 The man John Morrow spoke first, laying down his 
 spectacles between the pages to mark the place, and looking 
 at his wife and son, who glanced up at him as they heard his 
 voice. 
 
 " How the wind howls ! " he said. " It is the first wintry 
 night that we have had. We will have a heavy frost before 
 the morning." 
 
 " I hate the winter ! " exclaimed the boy impulsively, 
 putting down his pencil and brushing back his wavy locks 
 of hair. "If we had snow and ice as they have in the 
 North it would not be so bad, for then we could coast and 
 skate. But here we have nothing but rain and frozen mud. 
 I hate such winters as we have, I wish I was away."
 
 ARCHIBALD MOKROW. 11 
 
 " Archie ! Archie ! " said his mother, "you will never be 
 content till you have roamed over the whole world." 
 
 She smiled as she spoke, but there was a tone of sorrow 
 in her voice sorrow such as a mother always feels when 
 first her child shows a longing to leave her side, and to go 
 out into the great world away from her. 
 
 Such sorrow comes alike to the lower and the higher 
 orders of creation. Does not the cow low when her calf 
 runs away from her? Does not the mother bird twitter 
 anxiously upon the branch when her young ones have flown 
 too far away. But perhaps to man this sorrow comes more 
 poignantly than to those other animals inferior to him. 
 
 " If Archie wishes to fly the nest so soon," his father said, 
 " his wishes are likely to be speedily gratified." 
 The lad uttered an exclamation of surprise and pleasure. 
 " My old friend Tom Vance," continued his father " my 
 old friend Tom Vance has written to me that he and his 
 son are going abroad and would like you to go with them." 
 Archie leaped impulsively from his chair. " Oh I hope 
 I can go ! when do they start ? Oh, please, please let me go." 
 " Your mother and I," his father said, " have talked the 
 matter over. "We are loath to part with you, but it is a 
 rare chance. Arthur Vance is nearly your age, he will 
 study music and painting abroad, and you can do the same; 
 while his father will watch over you both. Would you like 
 to go?" 
 
 "Like to!" ejaculated the boy. "Like to! I would 
 give worlds to ! You will let me go, won't you ? " 
 
 "But it is so sudden," his mother said. "It is only a 
 month, and that seems so short a time to equip you to go 
 out into the great world." 
 
 "A month! A whole month!" Archie answered ex* 
 citedly. " It is a month too long. I wish it were a week 
 a day to-morrow ! Just think of my studying abroad !
 
 12 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 I shall come home a great artist or a great musician and 
 make a great name for myself; and how proud you will be 
 of me then ! And I shall make money, and you will leave 
 this house and go and live with me in a palace in a great 
 house in one of the big cities. Oh, please let me go ! " 
 
 " There is no use of our keeping you in suspense, my son," 
 his father replied. "We have decided to let you go if 
 nothing intervenes to change our determination between 
 now and the time of your leaving. " 
 
 When Archie's first excitement had died away, he begged 
 his father to tell him something about theVances. 
 
 " There is still half an hour before bedtime," his father 
 answered; " I will tell you how I first met Tom Vance. To- 
 morrow I will tell you something about his later history 
 and about his son." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE EARLY HISTORY OF THOMAS VANCE. 
 
 FARMER MORROW drew his chair round to the hearth, 
 while Archie cast himself down upon the rug by his father's 
 side. The older man filled his pipe, and lighted it with a 
 coal from the fire; then in a thoughtful tone of voice, as if 
 calling up the memories of the past, he spoke as follows: 
 
 " When I was about sixteen years of age I had some 
 trouble with my lungs and the doctor ordered me to go 
 South to escape the rigors of our Northern winter. The 
 Vances were cousins of my mother, not very near relations, 
 third or fourth cousins only I believe. They lived upon a 
 fertile plantation not far from the city of New Orleans and 
 within sight of the muddy Mississippi. 
 
 " The house was a large and aristocratic mansion, which,
 
 HISTORY 01? THOMAS VAtfCE. 13 
 
 in spite of its age for it had been built in colonial times 
 was in thorough repair. 
 
 " Houses, like persons, have their appearances and indi- 
 vidualities. Some show clearly that their inmates are poverty 
 stricken; others tell the tale of present wealth and comfort; 
 and others, dilapidated and forsaken though they be, seem 
 to cry aloud from open window and broken doorway, ' We 
 have a history.' So you see, my boy, it was no misnomer for 
 me to apply the term ' aristocratic ' to the house in question. 
 
 " This plantation belonged at that time to Tom Vance, 
 for his father, Laurence Vance, had died the year before and 
 left Tom, an orphan, in the care of his Aunt Matilda. It 
 was her invitation to become an inmate of this old mansion 
 which I so gladly accepted. And when I reached there 
 and became one of the guests of that hospitable household I 
 was accorded the kindliest welcome as one of the family. 
 
 " Tom was about my own age then, and a fine, manly 
 young fellow. I took a liking to him right off, and I think 
 that he liked me too, although I was still too weak from my 
 illness to join in all his sports. 
 
 " One evening when all, except Aunt Matilda and myself, 
 had gone off on a night hunt, I begged her to tell me some- 
 thing of Tom's parents, and sitting there in the moonlight 
 she told me how Tom's mother had died when he was yet a 
 youth, leaving him to be reared by her. Then passing on 
 through the intervening years, she told me how his father 
 had died, how he had been killed in Mexico. 
 
 " I need not tell you about the Mexican war, for you will 
 find that in your books, although its history has never been 
 properly written. Its achievement was as dashing as any of 
 Napoleon's campaigns; it witnessed individual acts of hero- 
 ism as grand as any the earth ever knew, and it had the 
 peculiarity of being a successful war waged against the wishes 
 of the President and his cabinet.
 
 14 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " Well, I was going to tell you what Aunt Matilda told me. 
 
 "Laurie, poor Tom's father, was my brother, as you 
 know, she said, and we had lived upon this plantation 
 with our grandparents ever since we were five years old, for 
 we were orphans at that early age. 
 
 " Like all Southern families of that day we owned slaves; 
 but my grandfather was a kind, humane man and would 
 never allow the whip to be used upon his place nor a slave 
 to be harshly treated, so that the plantation was a happy one 
 and house-servants seemed like members of the family. 
 
 " I was just sixteen years old when Laurie, who was four 
 years older than I, came from West Point on a furlough. 
 He had grown so tall and handsome that I was very proud 
 of him, and all the girls in the neighborhood were just wild 
 about him. Now at that time a pretty mulatto girl, about 
 my own age, was my maid. She was named Felice, and 
 was engaged to be married to one of the house-servants. 
 
 "Years before, my grandmother, traveling to New 
 Orleans, had taken a fancy to a little baby, the child of a 
 slave woman going to New Orleans to be sold. My grand- 
 father had bought them both for her, and the child had been 
 christened ( Sunbeam,' partly on account of his color, for 
 he was nearly white, and partly because grandfather had 
 bought him on a boat of that name. As he grew up he be- 
 came a house-servant, and his engagement to Felice was ap- 
 proved by us all. He would have been a happy fellow if 
 Felice had not tormented him by flirting with her other 
 admirers. 
 
 " Laurie had been home about a month when I was 
 awakened one night by a commotion outside in the shrub- 
 bery. My windows were open and as I sat up I could plainly 
 hear my brother swearing and a woman sobbing, and two or 
 three other voices. I rushed to the window, but it was too 
 dark for me to see anything, so hastily throwing on my
 
 HISTORY OP THOMAS VAKCE. 15 
 
 wrapper I went to my Grandmother's room. She was up 
 and looking very pale and frightened, and we stayed there 
 together until Grandfather came back and told us to go to 
 bed. 
 
 " The next day I learned what had happened; how 
 Laurie had come across Sunbeam and Felice in the shrub- 
 bery, and how Sunbeam had struck him; but I knew nothing 
 of this when I went to bed, and I thought of all sorts of 
 horrid things until I cried myself to sleep. 
 
 " The next morning a sober old negro woman, my grand- 
 mother's maid, came in answer to my ring, and when I asked 
 for Felice I was told that she was locked up and was to be 
 sent away, and that my grandfather would not let me see her. 
 Later in the day I heard it whispered among the servants 
 that Sunbeam had been whipped until he had fainted. It 
 was the first whipping that any one remembered on the 
 plantation, and the servants went about with a subdued 
 frightened air. Laurie did not leave his room for several 
 days, and when he did there were marks of a wound upon 
 his forehead he carried the scar of it with him to his grave. 
 
 " That night Sunbeam and Felice disappeared. As 
 they were valuable slaves Grandfather made every effort to 
 capture them, but they got away safely and never were 
 brought back. 
 
 " After a while Laurie went back to West Point, and 
 graduating, became a lieutenant, and in a little time the 
 whole thing was forgotten, save when the scar upon his fore- 
 head served to recall it. Then Laurie was married and Tom 
 was born, and after Grandfather's death Laurie left the Army 
 and took charge of this plantation ; but when Mexico de- 
 clared war against us Laurie was one of the first to volun- 
 teer. 
 
 " It is scarcely a year ago since we received letters from 
 Laurie inclosed in others from a brother officer. It was
 
 16 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 from these letters that I learned what I am about to tell you 
 how and why he died. 
 
 " The troops of which Laurie's command formed a part 
 were camped among the mountain chains that guard the 
 approach to the City of Mexico, and Laurie a Captain then 
 was with his troop somewhat in advance of the main body, 
 when a Mexican was brought in b/ the guard, desirous of 
 talking to the commander. 
 
 " At that time our forces had suffered greatly from the 
 depredations of guerrilla bands, and especially from one led 
 by the Chieftain Jurillo. They were not part of the regu- 
 lar Mexican force, but rather roving bands, robbing alike 
 either party, killing their unknown prisoners and holding 
 the rich ones to ransom. 
 
 " This Mexican, Laurie learned, had come to the camp 
 offering, for a certain sum of money, to guide a party to the 
 lurking place of Jurillo. Laurie knew how important the 
 capture of this man was, and so, with a ( body guard, he set 
 out, the Mexican guiding him and agreeing as a guarantee 
 of good faith that he should not receive his reward until 
 Jurillo was captured. They came at last to a ruined tower, 
 and here the guide begged Laurie to dismount and ascend 
 with him to the summit, from whence, he said, the hiding 
 place of Jurillo, a ruined hacienda, could be seen. So, while 
 his escort halted among the trees outside, Laurie ascended 
 with his guide. Sure enough the dilapidated buildings 
 could be seen through openings in the trees; but while 
 Laurie was examining them through his field glass he was 
 struck a violent blow upon the head and knocked senseless. 
 
 " When he partially recovered his senses it was some 
 time before he could realize where he was or what had hap- 
 pened. He was lying upon the ground blindfolded, with a 
 gag in his mouth and with his arms and legs securely bound. 
 At last he heard voices approaching and he was lifted up
 
 'HE WAS STRUCK A VIOLET BLOW ON THE HEAD." Page 16.
 
 18 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 from the earth and placed upon the back of a mule, and 
 then at the word of command the band started forward. 
 At first two of his captors rode by his side lest he should fall 
 off, for his arms were still bound though his legs had been 
 unfastened, but finding that he needed no assistance they 
 fell to the rear and Laurie could hear them every now and 
 then conversing in low tones. He thought that there must 
 be twenty or more in the band, judging from the hoof beats 
 that he heard as they cautiously but rapidly moved on. There 
 was, however, nothing for him to do but to exercise patience 
 and resignation words easily pronounced, virtues difficult 
 of practice. 
 
 " Laurie's thoughts grew confused, so that he had no idea 
 how long they traveled. His head still ached from the 
 blow it had received, and finally he would have fallen to the 
 ground had his guards not ridden to his side and steadied 
 him. 
 
 " At length the band stopped and Laurie heard the wel- 
 come sound of horsemen dismounting, and a few minutes 
 afterwards he was lifted down, carried away and brutally 
 dropped upon the ground. Soon, however, he was again 
 visited and placed in a sitting posture against a post, to 
 which he was bound by ropes. The gag was taken from 
 his mouth, the bandage from his eyes, and food and water 
 were given to him. 
 
 " He saw that he was in an adobe hut, that a Mexican, 
 with a short carbine across his knees, sat in the open door- 
 way, smoking a cigarette, and from the glimpses that he 
 could catch of the scene outside he judged that the place 
 was a little barranca among the hills. 
 
 "In the evening he was again blindfolded, and the 
 band traveled onward. Laurie thought that they must be 
 a good distance from the army, for the banditti were more 
 careless than they had been before and laughed and sang
 
 HISTORY OF THOMAS VANCE. 19 
 
 as if all necessity for caution had ceased. Toward day- 
 break they reached a hacienda, which they called San Bene, 
 and Laurie was locked up in a stone house which had, 
 besides the door, but one small opening near the roof to let in 
 light and air. His heart sank as he looked around, for he 
 saw but little chance of his escaping from his prison. Ap- 
 parently his captors were also satisfied with the security of 
 the place where they had lodged him, for they unbound him 
 and left him at liberty to move about, only they took the 
 precaution to bar and bolt the door after them. 
 
 " Laurie remained there for three days, seeing nothing of 
 his captors except when they brought him his meals, and 
 catching his only glimpses of the. outside world as the door 
 of his prison opened. At last he was led forth and found 
 himself before a group of some thirty or forty desperate- 
 looking fellows who were collected beneath the spreading 
 branches of a tree; while one, who seemed to be their leader, 
 reclined rather than sat upon a rude couch made of a few 
 logs with branches thrown over them. It was not a pleasant- 
 looking company to be ushered into ; the men were small, 
 rough-looking fellows, with complexions of every shade, from 
 the black of the Negro and red of the Indian to the paleness 
 of the Spaniard, and seemed ready for any mischief or 
 cowardly deviltry which might come in their way. 
 
 " There was a kind of uniform, or more properly speak- 
 ing, a kind of similarity, in their costumes. The broad 
 sombreros were gray and white, laden with pendants of 
 Spanish and American gold coins (spoils of some camp or 
 battlefield) intermixed with curious silver work of native 
 manufacture, with bands of silver about the crowns, and long 
 feathery plumes. The trousers were of leather with the 
 seams opening from the knee downward, and ornamented 
 with broad stripes of silver. The men wore also short riding 
 jackets of colored cloth and a broad red sash was wound 
 around their waists.
 
 20 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " Their leader gazed curiously at Laurie as he was led 
 forward, and Laurie returned his gaze, wondering if he had 
 not seen his face before. 
 
 " ' Remove your hat/ said one roughly, and as Laurie hesi- 
 tated his hat was snatched from his head. He turned to 
 strike down the insulter, but a movement of the Chieftain 
 caught his eye and arrested his arm. The Chief had half 
 risen, his hands clutched the arms of his rustic seat, his 
 head was thrown forward and his eyes were stretched to 
 their utmost as if they would devour Laurie's face. At that 
 moment Laurie would have sworn that he had seen the face 
 before but where, he could not tell. It was but a moment, 
 and then the leader of the outlaws sank back into his seat 
 and pulled the broad brim of his sombrero over his eyes so 
 that his face was in deep shadow. The band had either 
 not noticed his action or had thought it merely a motion to 
 prevent a fight, and the business of the hour proceeded. 
 Laurie was examined as to who he was and where he came 
 from, whether he was married, how much property he had, 
 and many other questions were put to him as he supposed 
 for the purpose of fixing a ransom. 
 
 " The conversation o the band was carried on in a Mexi- 
 can dialect which Laurie could not follow, although the fre- 
 quent repetition of the word pesos, which he knew meant 
 dollars, strengthened the supposition. At last, he was re- 
 manded to his prison. 
 
 " He was left there for some hours; then two men came 
 in, and having bound his hands behind his back led him out 
 into the air again. They left him standing in the open 
 and went away, while their chief came from the shadow of 
 the tree and stood before him. 
 
 " ' Well, Seflor Laurie/ he said removing his sombrero 
 and speaking in English, ' do you know me now ? ' 
 
 " The face was strangely familiar, but Laurie could not 
 place it and he said so.
 
 HISTOKY OF THOMAS VANCE. 21 
 
 "'So you have forgotten me?' said the leader, while a 
 grim smile played over his features. ' I should have thought 
 that the scar upon your forehead would have burned re- 
 membrance into your brain.' 
 
 " ' Sunbeam! ' Laurie exclaimed. 
 
 " 'Yes, Sunbeam !' the Chief answered with a fiendish 
 sneer upon his face, which as he spoke became distorted 
 with anger. ' Sunbeam ! Whose back still bears the record 
 of the day he dared to raise his hand to protect his honor. 
 Sunbeam once a slave, now a free man a rich man and a 
 strong one. Sunbeam, who has waited long for his revenge 
 and sees it now before him. I have bought you from your 
 captors and you are now my slave. You have bought slaves 
 before. You know the rights Avhich purchase gives ! You 
 are my slave now ! ' 
 
 " A pang of mortal terror shot through Laurie's heart 
 before the fiendish triumph and delight of Sunbeam. He 
 knew that this opportunity for revenge would be cruelly, 
 remorselessly used; but he struggled against it and strove i^ 
 awaken in his heart a stern endurance, a resolute contempt 
 of death. 
 
 " In fierce exultation, with wolfish rage and ferocity, 
 Sunbeam broke forth again. 
 
 " ' Ha- ha-ha!' he shouted, striking Laurie on the face with 
 his open palm, ' the whipping that follows this blow will not 
 be on my back! Has the dainty flesh which a slave's hand 
 might not touch in anger has it hardened with time so 
 that the blow of the driver's whip will cause no pain ? You 
 will find that others can plot as well as you dog, traitor, 
 scoundrel ! How dismal you look ! Are you not grateful 
 to me for remembering your former kindness ? But there 
 is a reckoning between us that must be settled. Your pay- 
 ment will be prompt and sure.' 
 
 " He drew a pistol from the sash which was wound around
 
 22 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 his waist and held the muzzle within a foot of Laurie's head; 
 but Laurie had collected himself and stood facing him calmly 
 awaiting the flash and the concussion. 
 
 " ' You are not afraid ! ' Sunbeam shouted, with a roar like 
 that of a wild beast; ' but to-morrow we will see how your 
 courage holds out. Then and thereafter, until you die, 
 you shall be whipped as I was whipped years ago. Now go 
 and dream of the pleasure that awaits you ! ' 
 
 " At his signal four men appeared, and seizing Laurie 
 they thrust him again into prison." 
 
 CHAPTEK III. 
 
 MORE HISTORY 
 
 " IT was an awful threat which Sunbeam had given, and 
 Laurie realized its full horror as he was led back to his prison 
 and the door shut upon him. There was no food and no 
 water given to him and he suffered from an agonizing thirst. 
 
 " At midnight there was a noise at the prison door. He 
 listened and heard the bars of the door taken noiselessly 
 down. He groped around for something to defend himself 
 with, but his arms were still tied and he could find no 
 weapon. He approached the door and stood ready to spring 
 out, trusting to find a speedy death in his effort to escape. 
 
 "The door swung slowly upon until a thin crack of 
 starlight was visible and a low voice spoke cautiously in 
 Spanish, Oiga, 'Senorf 
 
 " Laurie drew a deep sigh of relief, for he recognized a 
 woman's voice and guessed at once that it was a friendly 
 errand that had brought her there. He answered in English, 
 ' I am here.' 
 
 " The door opened wider, and a woman closely muffled
 
 MORE HISTORY. 23 
 
 in a black roboso entered. She gazed at him for a moment, 
 and then, speaking in English, said, as she dropped the 
 roboso from her face, ' Seflor Laurie, do you know me ? ' 
 
 " ' Felice ! ' he exclaimed. 
 
 " * Yes, Seflor/ she answered, ' I am Felice. Will you 
 trust me ? ' 
 
 " e Trust you ? Indeed I will/ Laurie replied. 
 
 " She drew a knife from the folds of her gown and cut 
 the cords that bound him. ' Here/ she said, giving him a 
 flask of wine, ' drink this, and then quickly and silently chafe 
 you stiffened arms/ 
 
 ' He did as he was bid, while she in low eager whispers 
 questioned him about those he had left at home, until his 
 circulation was restored and he prepared to follow her. She 
 guided him along a path through the cactus growth and 
 chapparal until they came to a deep arroyo, or bed of a dry 
 water-course. Here were two horses saddled and bridled 
 in charge of an athletic muchacho about fourteen years old. 
 
 " ' Mount, Seflor Laurie/ she said. ' Mount and ride for 
 your life. Stay not ! Linger not ! ' she added as he hesitated 
 for a moment, ' the time is all too short. Remember what 
 horrible torture Sunbeam has destined for you/ 
 
 " Laurie vaulted into the saddle and his guide rode ahead 
 leading the way. Sometimes their road led by the side of a 
 scanty stream along the bottom of a barranco, or deep rocky 
 valley, among the loose rocks and stones which the stream 
 had gathered in its Autumnal violence. At other times 
 they Avended their way over a rambla, or dry bed of a torrent 
 cut deep into the mountains, filled with shattered fragments 
 of rock and shagged by immense cliffs and precipices, which 
 formed the lurking places of ambuscades in war times as 
 afterwards they became the favorite haunts of robbers, from 
 whence they sallied forth to waylay unfortunate travelers. 
 Again their paths were steep, rocky and almost impassable,
 
 24 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 where the horses had no room for action and were barely 
 manageable, having to scramble from rock to rock and up 
 and down declivities where there was scarcely footing for a 
 goat. And over all hung the shadow of the beetling cliffs, 
 making their way dark and gloomy. 
 
 " Fatigued and wearied, when the day broke they shel- 
 tered themselves in a natural grotto under an overhanging 
 rock, while a bubbling fountain gave them the means of 
 slaking their thirst and refreshing their exhausted steeds. 
 The careful forethought of Felice had hung to each saddle- 
 bow a small bag of pinole, parched corn and sugar, and this, 
 mixed with water till it became like gruel, was food for man 
 and beast. 
 
 " When evening fell they mounted again and pursued 
 their journey, until in the light of early dawn the Guide 
 touched Laurie's shoulder and pointing to the white tents 
 of an encampment a mile or two away said, ' Mira, Seflor 
 mio; then turned and galloped away. 
 
 " Laurie waited where he had been left until the light 
 grew stronger and he could see the Stars and Stripes floating 
 in the morning breeze, then he put spurs to his horse and 
 galloped down. 
 
 " Great was the surprise of officers and men when they 
 saw a mounted officer riding into camp, and many were their 
 exclamations of astonishment when his adventure was nar- 
 rated. Laurie wrote a long letter to us at home telling us 
 about it, and with that letter came another from a brother 
 officer telling us that he was dead. 
 
 ; ' Two days afterwards, this latter letter said, this troop 
 of United States soldiers surprised the guerrillas and cap- 
 tured many. Only two shots were fired one by Laurie as 
 he led the charge one by Sunbeam as he stood at bay. 
 And when the melee was over two dead bodies were carried 
 from the field. One was the body of Sunbeam, shot through
 
 MORE HISTORY. 25 
 
 the heart ; the other was that of Laurie, with the old wound 
 opened and a bullet in his brain.' }: 
 
 When Farmer Morrow ended there was a long pause, as if 
 his mind was silently dwelling upon the memory of those 
 old days. He roused himself at last, however, and turning 
 to Archie said: 
 
 " Such was the way that Tom Vance's father died. To- 
 morrow I will tell you more about Tom Vance himself. 
 Now it is time for you to go to bed." 
 
 Archie arose and kissed his mother and father good night. 
 But when he slept it was to dream over the scenes of the 
 story which his father had told to him. 
 
 During the days which intervened between the time of 
 Archie's departure from home his father told him the whole 
 history of Thomas Vance's life told him how he had had 
 a sister, many years younger than he, who had been stolen 
 when she was an infant and who had never been found, al- 
 though the family had ever made a search for her told 
 him how old Mr. Vance had gone blind before he died. So 
 that Archie knew the whole history of the Vance family and 
 grew more and more anxious to meet his fellow travelers. 
 
 One month afterwards Archibald Morrow left the home 
 where he was born. He bore with him wise counsels and ad- 
 monitions, and loving prayers and well-wishes followed him 
 on his journey. But best of all he bore within his own 
 soul high resolves and noble aspiration, and his mind, glanc- 
 ing with youthful hopefulness far ahead, pictured to him 
 his return, crowned with honors, reverenced by men, hon- 
 ored by all. 
 
 Soldiers, statesmen and poets may have ambitions, but the 
 ambitions of a boy outstrip them all. 
 
 But could Archibald Morrow have foreseen the tempests 
 that would beset him, the hideous shadows that would 
 darken his life, he would have paused have shrunk back 
 affrighted.
 
 26 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 A CHANGE OF IDENTITIES. 
 
 NINE years passed away, during which Archibald Morrow 
 did not once revisit his home among the Kentucky hills. 
 They had been busy years to Arthur Vance and Archibald 
 Morrow, years in which spells of hard study alternated with 
 times of rest and recreation, years checkered with joy and 
 sorrow, with mirth and grief, years in which the two youths 
 had grown out of boyhood into manhood. 
 
 Together they had visited the countries of Europe, had 
 studied art in Paris and music in the song-loving land of 
 Italy. Time had but cemented their friendship for each 
 other. They had grown to be like one another in personal 
 appearance and each had the same manner of speech and 
 bearing, and those who did not know them well could not 
 tell them apart. Each had the same curling brown hair, 
 each the same clear gray eyes, each wore a silken, drooping 
 brown mustache. Yet there was a difference in their 
 figures, for though they were both about the same height, 
 Archibald Morrow was the stouter and more muscular of 
 the two. 
 
 They sat one day on a bench in a garden in a quaint, old- 
 fashioned town in Southern Spain a large and pleasant 
 garden where palms grew next to olive trees and innumera- 
 ble flowers blossomed in their shade. Behind them was 
 the house where they were sojourning, a low, stone building 
 whose architecture bore unmistakable signs of Moorish 
 handicraft and irresistibly carried the mind back to the 
 times when the Moors dominated over Spain. Before them
 
 A CHAXGE OF IDENTITIES. 
 
 stretched the blue waters of the Mediterranean, sparkling 
 under the rays of the setting sun and broken into gentle 
 ripples by the soft breathing of the evening zephyr which 
 languidly blew over the sea and land. 
 
 The two men were clothed in suits of mourning, for 
 Thomas Vance had died the year before. Koman fever, 
 caught in the Imperial City, had caused his death, and the 
 young men still mourned for him. His large fortune had 
 descended to his son, who had freely shared it with his friend, 
 so that the two men had but one purse in common and were 
 bound more closely by the ties of mutual friendship. 
 
 The gay life of the European capitals had become dis- 
 tasteful to them and they had sought out this little-known 
 and unfrequented inn, where none knew them and where 
 foreigners seldom came; had sought it out not only to get 
 away from the whirl and glitter of the town but also be- 
 cause Arthur had become enfeebled with long watching by 
 the bedside of his father and hoped to find renewed strength 
 in rest and quiet. His father's death had left him singularly 
 alone in the world. He was an only child, without a known 
 relative, and his heart clung with desperate tenacity to Archi- 
 bald as his only friend. 
 
 The two young men sat silent for some time smoking 
 their cigarettes and watching the scene before them. At 
 last Arthur Vance rose wearily and said: 
 
 " Archie, I feel strangely tired, I think I will go in and 
 sleep a little while." 
 
 Archie rose also, and his quick energetic manner brought 
 the languor of his companion into greater contrast. 
 
 " You are not well," he said. " I have noticed that you 
 have been growing more and more easily fatigued more 
 and more listless. Had we not better return to Paris, where 
 you can have medical attendance ? It would be sad if you. 
 were ill in such a place as this ! "
 
 28 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " Oh, I shall be better after a nap," Arthur replied lightly, 
 trying to laugh away the concern that he saw upon his 
 friend's face. " To-morrow I shall be all right." 
 
 But an earthly to-morrow never dawned for Arthur 
 Vance. He grew weaker as the night deepened, and Archie, 
 in hot haste, despatched messengers for the nearest physi- 
 cians. Until they came he sat by the bedside of his friend, 
 trying with his feeble energies to uphold him in his battle 
 with the grim destroyer. 
 
 Hours had worn away and medical aid had not arrived 
 when Arthur awoke from a light and seemingly troubled 
 slumber, and stretching out his arm he took Archie's hand 
 in his own. 
 
 " Archie, old friend," he said, " for many happy years 
 we have been like brothers. What we have had we have 
 had in common; what AVO have done we have done together. 
 But there is a thing, dear fellow, that I have left undone, 
 something that I know now will wrong you. But, oh Archie, 
 I never thought that I should die so soon. You need not 
 shake your head like that, dear friend, I know full well 
 that typhoid has seized me. I have only a few hours of 
 sensibility, only a few days of life remaining. Kiss me, dear 
 friend, and say that you forgive me." 
 
 Archie bent down and kissed him. "Whatever your 
 offence may be," he said, " it is forgiven." 
 
 "Dear Archie," said the sick man again, "believe me I 
 would fain live for your sake. You are not fitted to bear 
 the stings of poverty. I always meant that whether I lived 
 or whether I died my fortune should be yours, but now that 
 I feel the hand of Death upon me I know well that I have 
 sinned against you. Archie, I have never made a will." 
 
 That night Arthur Vance died died before any will 
 could be made died in the arms of his friend, whom his 
 death doomed to comparative poverty.
 
 A CttAXGE OF IDENTITIES. 29 
 
 Who can tell what a conflict of emotions raged in Archi- 
 bald Morrow's heart then. He felt grief for his friend and 
 a great sorrow that Death had shaken down the pleasant 
 prospect of his own life. All the remainder of the night 
 he paced, in sorrowful meditation, up and down the narrow 
 corridor outside the dead man's room. His soul was filled 
 with a vague despair and fierce rebellion at the future which 
 he seemed to see before him. 
 
 Tempestuous thoughts and wild ideas filled his brain. 
 Why should he be doomed to poverty or a life-long struggle 
 for daily bread ? His friend had left no kith nor kin to be 
 wronged by what he wished to do. The fortune would es- 
 cheat to the State or be eaten up by the greed of lawyers. 
 The name was like an empty shell waiting for the first comer 
 to seize upon it. He and Arthur had been strangers in a 
 strange land no one knew them they were alike in face 
 he knew all of his dead friend's affairs there was no one 
 to be wronged. 
 
 As the moments flew by the desire to personate the dead 
 man grew greater upon him. He did not fear the chance 
 of detection, for let him live for a few years in some remote 
 corner of the earth and when he emerged again who would 
 know that he was not Arthur Vance ? But something in- 
 stinctively held him back. Conscience, that inward moni- 
 tor, strove to restrain him, and he shuddered at the thought 
 of being so untrue to the memory of his friend. 
 
 The struggle continued until the daylight dawned, and 
 when the sun arose in the heavens conscience was beaten 
 down and defeated and Archibald had decided to take upon 
 him the personality of the man who had died. 
 
 So when the authorities came to record the death of the 
 stranger he gave them his own name, and all the world 
 except himself supposed that it was Archibald Morrow 
 whose lifeless clay was laid at rest under the palm trees.
 
 30 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 A GAMBLER. 
 
 THE scene shifts to the City of New York and the time 
 is two years after that solemn burial of the stranger in the 
 foreign land of Spain. 
 
 It was the night of the last day of the year New Year's 
 Eve. A man closely muffled in a heavy fur-lined cloak, 
 with warm fur gloves upon his hands, came down the steps 
 of a house in one of the side streets between Madison 
 Square and Central Park. The street door as it opened for 
 his egress let out a flood of light, then closed after him and 
 the house was dark again. The man reached the sidewalk 
 and stood there for a moment, as if irresolute where to 
 direct his steps. A cold blast of the west wind blew up the 
 street against him and he shivered a trifle beneath his furs 
 and pulled up the collar of his coat. Then with a muttered 
 imprecation he turned and walked down Fifth Avenue. 
 The street was nearly deserted and his footfalls rang out, 
 clear and distinct, in the sharp air. The night was still and 
 cold. The moon, nearly full, was in the zenith and shone 
 with icy splendor on the bare streets and on the dull brown 
 walls of the houses. In its pale light everything seemed to 
 take a strangely unfamiliar look, but the man scarcely 
 heeded the appearance of the night, for his mind was intent 
 with its inward thoughts and cogitations, and was filled with 
 that grim visitor Remorse. 
 
 Woe to a man when he is haunted by Remorse ! 
 foes he can hide or flee from death he can battle with and 
 defeat misfortune, poverty and woe he can laugh at but
 
 A GAMBLER. 31 
 
 Remorse is stronger and more implacable than them all. He 
 may seek the haunts of vice, the cell of the hermit, the 
 laboratory of science, the classic shades of literature, he 
 may mix with the gay world or flee to the desert but go 
 where he will do what he may Remorse is ever with him. 
 Let him wake, and Remorse will control his thoughts. Let 
 him sleep, and Remorse will conjure dreams for him. It 
 makes his soul its abiding place and will not be driven 
 thence. Like a tyrant it will rule supreme. It will banish 
 hope; it will wither love; it will scourge him as only it 
 can scourge; it will curse him as only it can curse; it will rob 
 the daylight of its brightness and make the dark night 
 darker yet. 
 
 And since the day when Archibald Morrow had laid his 
 dead friend under the citrons and palms of Southern Spain, 
 Remorse had dwelt with him. It had driven him to wander 
 restlessly over the world. It had cursed the dead man's 
 money. It had made the dead man's memory a sad, bitter 
 and reproachful thing, which he sought in vain to forget. 
 It drove him to deeds of reckless dissipation and soon the 
 fortune which he had risked so much to gain, was gone. It 
 drove him to acts of crime which made him rich again; and, 
 then, it throve on deeds of its own making. 
 
 And now, in one of those moods of reckless dissipation 
 which remorse had brought upon him, he had once more 
 gambled away his wealth, and reduced himself almost to 
 poverty. Almost, not quite, for there were certain houses 
 in New York which had belonged to the dead man, and these 
 Archie had as yet refrained from selling. As he thought 
 of them an evil frown darkened his face and he swore almost 
 audibly. 
 
 At this moment a strain of music broke upon his ear and 
 aroused him; and looking around he saw that he stood 
 before a church. The stained-glass windows threw gleams
 
 32 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 of colored light out into the darkness, and the moonbeams 
 brought out more distinctly the gothic lines of the building 
 and the fretted stonework of the portal and threw parts of 
 the solid masonry and fantastic carvings into black shadow. 
 The music rose again, low and indeterminate, with a gentle 
 and somber dignity, like the strain of a far-off choir reach- 
 ing him through the weird night gulfs of the upper air. 
 
 He stood upon the pavement half listening, half in reverie. 
 The memories of his childhood's days, of his mother's prayers 
 by his bedside when she had laid him to rest, of his father's 
 wise words of admonition, came upon him like an avalanche. 
 
 A cab rattled noisily by over the rough stones and broke 
 the spell and he moved forward as if to enter. Up the steps 
 into the courtyard he strode and then halted as his eye fell 
 upon a strange sight. 
 
 Within a corner formed by a projecting buttress, almost 
 hidden in deep shadow, was a girl, six or seven years of age, 
 clothed in a ragged gown and with a tattered shawl thrown 
 over her head. By her side was a basket of matches, and 
 he knew that she was waiting until the New Year should 
 dawn and send forth the watchers from the church. But 
 it was weary waiting and she had fallen asleep, and now lay 
 in the bitter cold huddled in the angle of the stone-work. 
 
 Impelled by an instinct of pity Archie stepped forward to 
 arouse her, but halted abruptly, for he saw a shining object 
 in her lap. He knew well what it was a golden double 
 eagle which some charitable person seeing the little child 
 asleep had dropped into her lap. 
 
 A golden double eagle ! That was a fortune to the little 
 girl. Ah, if he only had as much ! He started at the 
 thought which entered his mind. A fortune for her ! Did 
 not it mean a fortune for him too ? All that evening he 
 had stood at the roulette-table and staked his money and 
 lost, but now ! Midnight was a lucky time to bet he
 
 A GAMBLER. 33 
 
 could borrow yes, it was only borrowing this piece go 
 back to the gambling house and return before the child 
 awakened. He glanced around to see if he was unobserved, 
 and then with trembling fingers he clutched the gold coin. 
 In an instant it had dropped into his pocket. 
 
 He stood erect and glanced again cautiously around. 
 Then with quick steps, almost running, he sped up the 
 avenue. He turned the corner and hurried up the steps of 
 the house which he had left but a few minutes before. It was 
 dark, and a stranger might have thought that it was de- 
 serted, but he knew that all was light and glitter within. 
 He paused for a moment to recall the signal which would 
 gain him admittance, and then rang the bell once thrice 
 twice a ad waited, listening, expecting that every moment 
 the clocks would chime out the hour of midnight. 
 
 The door swung ajar and a face peered cautiously out, 
 then, as he was recognized, the door opened wider, and as it 
 did so the clock on the neighboring church tower tolled one. 
 He passed in and synchronously he heard the second chime 
 of the bell and the clang of the closing door. He pushed 
 hurriedly through the group of men smoking in the front 
 room and entered the rear apartment, still in time, for he 
 yet heard the sound of the chimes, though muffled and in- 
 distinctly. 
 
 He threw the golden coin on the table and won. He 
 staked his winnings and won again, and again, and again 
 until the money was piled in heaps before him. He did 
 not stay for congratulations, but thrust the bank-bills and 
 the rouleaux of gold into his pockets and hurried back to 
 the church. 
 
 Was he in time ? Yes ! The child still slept. He shook 
 her gently by the shoulder and she opened her eyes and 
 stared sleepily at him. 
 
 " She is half frozen. If I had stayed longer she would 
 2
 
 34 THE POMFBET MYSTERY. 
 
 have died ! " he thought with a shudder. Aloud he said, 
 " Come with, me child, you must have something to warm 
 you!" 
 
 She arose and stood tottering, as if her benumbed legs re- 
 fused to support her; then he lifted her in his arms and 
 carried her down to Sixth Avenue, where he knew that there 
 was an oyster saloon that would be open. There the warm 
 air and food revived her. 
 
 He learned her history and where she lived, and when she 
 left the pocket of her tattered dress was crammed with 
 bank-notes how many he never knew, he put them in by 
 handf uls until the pocket would hold no more. 
 
 Not until she had gone did he realize that he had eaten 
 nothing since noon of the previous day. 
 
 He ate heartily and drank deeply more deeply than was 
 his wont for when his hunger was appeased thoughts arose 
 which he tried to drown in alcohol. In spite of all that he 
 could do his mind would revert to the events of the evening 
 to his ill-fortune to the golden coin of the match-girl 
 to his childhood's days to his wonderful luck at the gam- 
 ing table. He had won and returned a hundred fold but 
 
 if he had lost ! 
 
 He drank more deeply to hide the thoughts, but the ex- 
 citement which had ruled and sustained him before had 
 died out and the full meaning of his act was clear to him. 
 He could no longer deceive himself with the delusion that 
 he had merely borrowed the coin from the little girl. His 
 act was worse than that ! He saw it now, with all its hid- 
 eousness. The alcohol which he had imbibed was already 
 making itself felt in stimulating the mind and rendering 
 his powers of perception stronger and clearer. Later on it 
 would dim and obscure his faculties. 
 
 He tossed a coin to the waiter and passed out into the 
 frosty air, but his thoughts still followed him. The very
 
 "THEN HE LIFTED HER IN HIS ARMS AND CARRIED HER DOWN." Page 34.
 
 36 THE POMERET MYSTERY. 
 
 echo of his footsteps as he strode along seemed to cry out to 
 him, " Thief ! Thief ! " He felt a wild, reckless mood com- 
 ing upon him a fierce impenitence that made him mutter 
 curses as he strode along. " Theft I Well, what of that ? 
 Whose business was it, since he had returned more than he 
 took? Ah yes, but such a mean and petty theft ! 
 from a little match-girl ! He felt a sickening disgust with 
 himself for having stooped so low. His past crimes had 
 been so vast, so ambitious, that their very magnitude had 
 seemed to hide their full iniquity. But a single com- 
 
 a match-girl ! 
 
 The thought haunted him; and his soul, as he strode 
 
 onward, seemed a hell to him. 
 
 None but he who has been without friends can ever know 
 how terrible a thing it is to be f riendless-and that was this 
 man's condition. He had hosts of so-called friends-ac- 
 quaintances who liked his bright and merry humor-ac- 
 quaintances whom his money brought about him to enjoy 
 its benefits or to bask in its golden glitter-but his last 
 real true friend lay buried far away in Southern Spam, and 
 there was no one, now that remorse claimed him, to whom 
 he could go, no one to whom he could unburden his whole 
 heart and in whose silent and unspoken friendship he 
 could find strength and a refuge. Not that he would, 
 had there been such, have told the whole tale of his mis- 
 deeds, but he would have found relief in vague, mdefimt 
 self-reproaches and self-incriminations in a sort of coi 
 fession that would have relieved his conscience wit. 
 disclosing aught of the truth. 
 
 He reached his lodgings, staggered to his rooms, anc 
 throwing himself upon his bed fell into a drunken sleep. 
 But oh, what dreams came to him !
 
 POMFEET. 37 
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 POMFEET. 
 
 POMFEET was a thriving manufacturing town in the North- 
 eastern corner of Connecticut. A river ran through it, fur- 
 nishing power for many mills, and there were two railroads; 
 besides it was the market-town of the surrounding country. 
 The farmers came to it from miles around to sell the produce 
 of their farms, exchange the gossip of the neighborhood, 
 purchase their necessary supplies, or to see the various 
 theatrical troupes and circus shows that now and then stop 
 there. 
 
 The town itself was disfigured by the multitude of square, 
 unattractive tenements in which the poorer of the factory 
 hands slept and ate; but fortunately most of these structures 
 were in the side streets, and a stranger, passing hastily 
 through the town, would have called it pretty. Especially 
 would he have pronounced this opinion after viewing the 
 main street, which had once been the turnpike between 
 Boston and Hartford, and was broad, well kept and shaded 
 on either side by rows of overarching elms. 
 
 On one side of this street stood the Pomf ret Bank : a red- 
 brick, one-story structure with bars across the windows and 
 a stone set in the front wall over the door giving the name 
 of the institution and the date of the erection of the build- 
 ing. Adjoining the bank, and almost forming part of it 
 for a door wat> cut between the two buildings and you could 
 pass from one to the other was the dwelling of Squire 
 Leslie. 
 
 At nine o'clock" one Spring evening Ethel Leslie, the
 
 38 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 Squire's daughter, sat sewing in the parlor of her father's 
 house. It was somewhat cold outside and a fire crackled 
 on the hearth. She was alone, but she was not concerned 
 about that, for Pomfret was a quiet place and its people had 
 few visits from dangerous characters. But this night as 
 Ethel sat there quietly sewing she was startled by a noise 
 outside a noise which sounded like the moan of some 
 fellow-creature in distress. She dropped her work and 
 listened. 
 
 Every one who has been alone at night in an empty house 
 know hows distinctly all sounds fall upon the ear, and what 
 tremors they are apt to occasion even in the mind of the 
 most courageous person. A rat, nibbling behind the wain- 
 scoting, may be magnified into burglars trying the lock of 
 a door; the purring of the cat may seemed like the sup- 
 pressed breathing of a hidden man; sounds like careful 
 footsteps are heard overhead and the slamming of a door 
 fills one with nervous tremors. Ethel was courageous, but 
 the ghostly moaning which broke the stillness of the night 
 filled her with trepidation. 
 
 But as the sound was repeated it lost its terror and she 
 realized that it was indeed no ghostly manifestation but the 
 moan of a human being in pain. Although her fears were 
 allayed she could not but wish, as she rose from her chair, 
 that her father and Aunt Martha were at home. She had, 
 however, one protector in the house, and that was a large 
 Scotch collie, Rover by name, who had already heard the 
 sounds and was now sitting up upon the rug watching his 
 mistress with large, wistful eyes. Bidding him follow her, 
 she went to the door and opened it. The light of the lamp 
 in the hall shone out upon the porch and showed her the 
 form of a woman, lying prone upon her face and every now 
 and then uttering those moans which she had heard. 
 Ethel stood for a moment lost in amazement, pondering
 
 POMFEET. 39 
 
 what to do. She looked up and down the street hoping to 
 see some one whom she could call to her aid, but no one was 
 in sight. It was evident that the poor creature must be 
 brought into the house and that she alone would have to 
 do it; so she bent down and clasped her hands about the 
 slender form of the prostrate woman, and half-lifting half- 
 dragging, managed to carry her into the parlor and place 
 her on the lounge. But the motion had been more than 
 the feeble strength of the poor creature could endure and 
 Ethel saw that she had fainted. 
 
 Fortunately the dog had been trained to fetch and carry 
 and to bear messages from places in the village, and Ethel 
 hastily writing upon a slip of paper the words, " Come as 
 quickly as you can; a stranger is here ill/' signed her name 
 to it, and gave it to Hover, saying " Good doggie, carry to 
 Doctor Gamble's." 
 
 The dog wagged his tail as if to say that he understood and 
 bounded off, and Ethel was left alone with her charge. Do 
 what she would she could not rouse her from unconscious- 
 ness, and it was with joy that she heard a wagon roll into 
 the yard and knew that her father and Aunt Martha had 
 returned. 
 
 A few hurried words told them what had happened, and 
 Ethel had scarcely concluded her story when the Doctor 
 entered. Aunt Martha, bustling about, soon had a bed 
 prepared and the stranger was removed thither. 
 
 Under the Doctor's skillful care the stranger quickly re- 
 gained consciousness, and then the Doctor administered an 
 opiate and she sank into slumber. 
 
 " She needs rest more than medicines," the physician 
 remarked as he seized his hat and cloak preparatory to going 
 home. " I will stop in here in the morning, and then she 
 can tell us who she is." 
 
 " And I," said Ethel, " will sleep on a lounge in her room 
 so as to be at hand if she wakes. "
 
 40 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " You had better let me do that/' Aunt Martha said. 
 " No ! " Ethel rejoined. " I found her and so I will 
 watch." 
 
 The sun was high in the heavens and the day was partly 
 spent when the sufferer awoke from a deep and refreshing 
 slumber. As she moved restlessly and opened her eyes 
 Ethel was by her side. 
 
 " Where ami?" she murmured, as her eyes fell upon the 
 unaccustomed surroundings 
 
 "With friends/' Ethel answered. ."Yon have been 
 very ill and fell fainting at our door, last night. You must 
 not talk much." 
 
 The girl, for she was scarcely more than sixteen years of 
 age, sighed wearily as if Ethel's words had brought back to 
 her the memory of her agony. 
 
 " If you will lie still I will bring your breakfast and after 
 you have eaten that perhaps you will be strong enough to 
 tell us something about yourself," Ethel continued, and as 
 the sick woman murmured a low assent she left the room. 
 
 Strengthened and refreshed by the meal the invalid was 
 able to rise and was seated in a comfortable arm-chair when 
 the Doctor arrived. 
 
 " Now, Ethel," he said, " go down to Aunt Martha. I wish 
 to have a talk alone with my patient." 
 
 Ethel did as she was bid, and more than half an hour 
 passed before old Doctor Gamble called her back. 
 
 " She needs no medicine," he said as Ethel approached, 
 " but only rest. In a day or two she will be strong enough 
 to move about. Go to her now and get her to tell you her 
 story. I will come back again at night-fall." 
 
 As Ethel entered the room the stranger glanced at her 
 gratefully, exclaiming, " You are all so good to me ! " 
 
 " We have done no more than our duty," Ethel answered 
 with a smile. " But is there no one to whom you would like 
 word to be sent as to where you are ? "
 
 POMFKET. 41 
 
 The stranger sighed as she answered, " There is not one 
 who cares whether I live or die not one. But you have a 
 right to know my story," she continued, "to know who it 
 is that you have taken in and cared for. 
 
 " My name is Adele Adele Hollenbeck. I married against 
 my parents' wishes scarcely a year ago. They were am- 
 bitious, and had other plans for me, but though Henry was 
 only a carpenter I loved him. It is the old story they 
 forbade him the house, but we found means to communicate, 
 and one evening I stole out of my home and met him and 
 we were married. When my parents heard that, they dis- 
 owned me, and I have never neard from them since. 
 
 " For the first few months after we were married every- 
 thing went well with us, but then Henry fell into bad com- 
 pany and things changed. You can know nothing of that 
 sad story of the poor how bit by bit the husband slips into 
 evil ways into idleness and drunkenness how the wages 
 that he brings home become less and less until they are but 
 a few small coins, and at last nothing. Then one after 
 another the treasures of the household go to the pawnshop 
 then the furniture follows, and step by step the family 
 sinks lower and lower into poverty and distress. 
 
 " I bore with it all for a while, for I knew that I would 
 soon give birth to a child, and I thought that when the little 
 angel came Henry would leave off his evil ways and reform. 
 And I was right; for when the child was born Henry 
 changed and was kind and loving as he had been before. 
 But the babe died when it was but a few weeks old and 
 Henry took to his evil ways again. Even then I would have 
 tried to reform him, but he was worse than before, and some- 
 times he came home drunk and then he would beat me. 
 
 " I stood that life until I could stand it no longer. Then 
 some one told me I could get work in Boston, and I pawned 
 the last of my trinkets and with the money I bought my
 
 42 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 railway ticket. I thought that if I could get work away, 
 where Henry could not find me, I could perhaps save money 
 and by and by redeem him from the life of infamy that he 
 was leading. 
 
 " I took the slowest train because that was the cheapest, and 
 as we rolled farther and farther from New York I began to 
 feel more and more safe. But you know how that train 
 waits here until the fast express passes it, and as I was watch- 
 ing out of the car window I saw the express come rolling in 
 on the other side of the station. Judge my terror when I 
 saw Henry alighting from it. Some one must have told 
 him of my flight and he had followed me. 
 
 " I had only a small bundle, and I seized that and hurry- 
 ing to the platform of the car I jumped to the ground on 
 the side of the train away from the depot. A freight train 
 was on the next track and I crawled under that and stood 
 panting behind it until the passenger train had rolled out of 
 sight. I did not even know the name of the place where I 
 was, but I was willing to work, and I thought that I might 
 find something to do here as well as elsewhere. All the rest 
 of the day I vainly sought employment, and when night 
 came I found myself homeless and without money to pay 
 for a night's lodging or for food. Then it was that I saw 
 the light in your window and I determined to make one 
 more effort. But at your door my strength deserted me and 
 I fell helpless as you found me." 
 
 The tears were coursing down Ethel's cheeks as this sad 
 story was being told, and even the stranger's eyes were glis- 
 tening with moisture as she spoke. 
 
 "You must stay here until you get well and strong," 
 Ethel said, " then perhaps we can find some work for you 
 to do." 
 
 And so it came to pass that Adele Hollenbeck, when she 
 grew stronger, was installed as maid of all work in Squire 
 Leslie's family.
 
 AN ASSIGNATION. 43 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 AN ASSIGNATION. 
 
 ALL New England knew Squire Leslie. Knew him be- 
 cause as a boy he had fought with Perry on Lake Erie and 
 that was fame in days of old; knew him, because he owned 
 a little mill by the river that spun bales of cotton into twine 
 with which New England's storekeepers tied up their bun- 
 dles; knew him, because for forty years he had traveled 
 over the country stump- speaking for his party; and lastly, 
 he was well known in financial circles as the President and 
 principal owner of the Pomfret Bank. But the young men 
 of the town thought of him generally as the father of Ethel 
 Leslie. 
 
 Tall and stout, with a big head fringed with snowy locks 
 of hair and with a smooth shaven face somewhat reddened 
 by exposure to the elements, the Squire was a fine specimen 
 of the country magnate. 
 
 He had been a widower for many years, and since his wife's 
 death Ethel had kept house for him, assisted by Aunt 
 Martha, her mother's first cousin but Ethel's position was 
 a sinecure, for it was really Aunt Martha upon whom the 
 cares of the household fell. 
 
 The Squire was the last of a class of country magnates 
 now rapidly dying out of existence. Once the Squire of a 
 country town was one of the most important aristocrats of 
 New England. Being generally the only lawyer and Justice 
 of the Peace in the neighborhood he was employed to draw 
 the deeds and the wills and settle the quarrels of the neigh-
 
 44 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 bors, but he also occupied the more lucrative position of the 
 investor of the people's savings. They brought their hoards 
 to him and he put them out at interest, charging both lender 
 and borrower a commission. Sometimes too, the accumu- 
 lations of some twenty or thirty people would be invested 
 in one mortgage and one or two would want their share 
 before it fell due and the Squire had a chance to buy them 
 out at a discount. It was this conjunction of a law and a 
 banking business that made the Squires wealthy and enabled 
 them to live in the largest houses in the towns. But when 
 Savings Banks were established the importance of the Squire 
 waned, though the title did not become extinct, and one of 
 those to whom it still clung was old Herman Leslie. 
 
 Ethel Leslie, the Squire's daughter and the belle of 
 Pomfret, was eighteen years old. Her mother had died 
 when she was young and left her in Aunt Martha's charge. 
 In personal appearance she was short and rather slight, 
 though plump, and her eyes were dark blue, large and capa- 
 ble of changing almost in an instant from sparkling mis- 
 chief to tender love. Her complexion was clear and pure. 
 A bright color was in her cheeks, and each cheek had a 
 dimple which showed itself most bewitchingly when she 
 smiled. Her hair was thick and long and brown, with a 
 natural wave or ripple in it that enhanced its loveliness. 
 She was a picture of perfect health and girlish loveliness, 
 grace and innocence, but the careful observer, noting the 
 low, broad forehead and short, straight nose and square chin, 
 would have prophesied that there was in her nature a de- 
 termination and energy, a capability of loving dearly and of 
 suffering silently and bitterly. She had not often been 
 away from Pomfret, but she had learned all that the teachers 
 of the high school there could teach her, and the music 
 master of the town had found her an apt pupil in both 
 singing and playing.
 
 Atf ASSIGNATION. 45 
 
 By nature something of a coquette, she took pride in her 
 dress, which she wore with a natural grace and dignity. She 
 was fond of fun, and was the life of every frolic that took 
 place in the neighborhood. But underneath the vivacity 
 and high spirits natural to her youth and her good health 
 there was a fond, loving woman's nature, only waiting for 
 a pure deep love to develop it. 
 
 Some distance from the Squire's house, on the Main 
 Street, a little to the north of the bank, stood the Pomfret 
 Meeting House, and on its steps a group of men were chat- 
 ting, as country people do after " Meeting," a little more 
 than a year after Adele Hollenbeck had been rescued by 
 Ethel. Meeting was just over and the congregation had 
 just emerged from the building. 
 
 "Waal, Squire, you seem hearty," said Deacon Grosvenor 
 as he joined the group and addressed the Squire. " Fine 
 hayin' weather this." 
 
 " We always do have good hayin* weather on the Sabbath," 
 the Squire rejoined. "I have not been out your way for 
 quite a spell, Deacon ; what sort of crop will you have ? " 
 
 " Toler-ble, only toler-ble. It's been most too dry fur 
 the grass to grow well." 
 
 " I hear that widow Bixby's decided to sell her farm and 
 move West; has she had any offers for it ? " 
 
 " Waal, I thought suthin of buying myself, but that ere 
 stranger-fellow who's been staying at Hillhouse's has been 
 a sort o' nibblin' at it, an' I guess he kin pay more money 
 fur it than I kin." 
 
 " I have seen him about the town. Who is he ? " 
 
 " Fellow from New York stayin' down at the tavern. 
 Hillhouse says he's the best fellow I've seen fur a long while. 
 Sort o' artist chap I reckon; I seed him pantin' round the 
 country las' week." 
 
 " He's a good looking young fellow."
 
 46 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " Yes, that he is; just the kind o' feller the girls like, hey 
 Squire ! Them brown eyes and curly hair 'o his'n air difrent 
 from most folks'. Hillhouse says that he got lots o' money 
 and paints for fun only, and that he's going to stay all sum- 
 mer." 
 
 "Well/' said the Squire, " I guess that he'll be coming 
 down to bank then, before long. Hullo ! There's Chester 
 I'll walk down with him," and nodding good-by he went off 
 with Ephraim Chester, the cashier of the bank. 
 
 " Squire looks well," said one of the group that had been 
 left behind. " He's gettin' old though, an' don't walk as 
 light as he used." 
 
 "He must be a pretty rich man," rejoined another. 
 " Guess Ethel will have a plum when he dies." 
 
 " They say Benny Moore's mighty far gone on her. 
 Benny's a nice fellow, hope he gets her. He's 'bout got 
 through studying' law with the Squire, ain't he ? They say 
 he's going' to set up his shingle fur himself in the Fall." 
 
 Gradually the groups broke up. Those who lived in the 
 village walked away and those further from home backed 
 out their horses from the unpainted wooden sheds and drove 
 off, while some who came from a still greater distance and 
 who stayed for the afternoon services sought out shady spots 
 under the trees and ate the lunches that they had brought 
 with them. 
 
 Southward from the town, where the river widened out 
 and became more shallow and ran through low lying meadow- 
 lands and quiet groves of trees the people of Pomfret had 
 laid out a park. Little had been done except to reserve the 
 land and to place a few benches here and there and erect 
 rough board seats and tables for picnic parties. Nature had 
 done the rest, and it was well that it had been left for her 
 to do, for she was the best landscape gardener for so beauti- 
 ful a spot. The park was crowded during the Sunday
 
 AN ASSIGNATION. 47 
 
 afternoons with operatives from Pomf ret, but at night it was 
 deserted and quiet. 
 
 On this particular Sunday night, however, a solitary figure 
 might be seen pacing with slow steps up and down a narrow 
 streak of pebbly beach from which the river had shrunk 
 away for the days were hot and it was the season of the 
 Summer droughts. The moon, three quarters full, had 
 risen in the east, but the trees, over arching above the 
 solitary loiterer, shut off her rays from the path where he 
 trod. It was the stranger. 
 
 Every now and then he raised his head as some noise 
 reached his ear, and looked anxiously about him as if expect- 
 ing some one. The moon moved slowly into the zenith and 
 the moonbeams began to stray through openings in the 
 br mches of the trees and fall in patches of silver upon the 
 beach and the margin of the river. Vance, as he paced 
 upon and down, avoided these moonlit spots, keeping in the 
 shadow, as if anxious to escape any prying eye that might 
 be about. 
 
 Suddenly a low whistle smote upon his ear and he stopped 
 and listened. It was repeated and then he answered it. 
 Almost at once a clump of bushes parted and a face peered 
 out. It was a beautiful face beautiful always most 
 beautiful as it peered through the curtain of green leaves, 
 framed in the masses of dark golden hair of that hue that 
 artists love to paint upon their canvases of saints and 
 madonnas. The dark olive tint of its complexion the heri- 
 tage of her ancestors who had lived so many centuries in 
 sunny Italy, was brightened by the soft purity of the 
 moonlight and the heavy eyebrows and long lashes that 
 shaded her eyes made them seem blacker than the night 
 shadows under the trees. She looked to Vance as she 
 sprung from the bushes more like the apparition of an angel 
 than like a flesh-and-blood maiden.
 
 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " Carita mia," he said as he drew her close to him and 
 imprinted a kiss upon her low broad brow, " how beautiful 
 you are to-night I " 
 
 " Do you think so," she said smiling up at him, "it is for 
 joy of seeing you again." 
 
 ^ "Little flatterer," he answered kissing her once more, 
 you run no danger, I hope, in meeting me ? " 
 "No, I stole away after they were all in bed. Aunt 
 Martha, the Squire and Ethel were fast asleep when I came 
 away. But oh that horrid dog-he will not make friends 
 with me and he growled at me as I stole away till I feared 
 that some one would awaken." 
 
 " You should have smiled on him," he said, " for you are 
 beautiful enough to-night to touch the heart of even a 
 brute. But you have the powders which I gave you, have 
 you not, and should he grow troublesome you must use 
 them." 
 
 " I have them still, and when the time comes he must 
 take one. But you sent for me and I have come." 
 
 ' You are in the Squire's house and you have made use 
 of your opportunities ? " 
 
 " I have. All that you bade me do I have done. What 
 is there for me to do next ? " 
 
 " You must return now to New York " 
 
 "For good?" 
 
 " I do not yet know. What tale did you tell to them ? " 
 
 She told him and he pondered for a few minutes, then 
 he answered : 
 
 I leave it all to you, but leave the way open for your 
 return in case that should be necessary." 
 
 "^ Can you not tell me how long I shall stay away ? " 
 ' Not longer than a week, by that time I shall have made 
 my plans definitely." 
 "It is well, I snail do as you bid me. And now be-
 
 ARTHUR VAtfCE. 49 
 
 fore we part let me hear you say once again that you love 
 me." 
 
 For answer he clasped her tightly in his arms. " I love 
 you, little one/' he murmured, "I love you a thousand 
 times I love you. I love you more than you love me." 
 
 " That cannot be; every day since I have been here I have 
 looked up and down the road hoping to see your face. Ah 
 it was hard to wait through so many weary months." 
 
 " Poor little Adele," he murmured as he watched her 
 steal silently homeward. 
 
 He stood for a moment in silent reverie and then he mut- 
 tered to himself, "All has gone well so far. But the com- 
 bination how can I get the combination." 
 
 He started at the sound of his own mutterings and then 
 rousing himself he walked swiftly homeward. 
 
 % CHAPTEK VIII. 
 
 ARTHUR VANCE. 
 
 THE next morning while the squire was in the Bank, Jack 
 Hillhouse, the tavern keeper, and the stranger walked into 
 the room. 
 
 " Morning Squire," said the tavern keeper; " this is Mr. 
 Vance. He's abordin' with me an wants ter leave a little 
 money with you for a while. I tole him I guessed you'd 
 'commodate him." 
 
 "Certainly, sir, certainly. Pray take a seat," said the 
 Squire; then raising his voice he called aloud, "Mr. 
 Chester ! " 
 
 " Well, seein' as I ain't no further use I guess I'll go. 
 Mornin', gentlemen," and the tavern keeper left the room. 
 
 " Mr. Chester," said the Squire raising his voice and ad-
 
 50 THE'fOMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 dressing the cashier in the outer office, " this is Mr. Vance, 
 he wishes to make a deposit." 
 
 "How much, sir?" 
 
 " Five hundred," said Archie, taking out a pocket book 
 and extracting from it ten fifty-dollar bills. 
 
 " Step this way, please, sir, and sign the book. Thank 
 you, sir. Arthur Vance," continued the cashier reading 
 what was written; " you write a good hand, Mr. Vance. Take 
 a seat for a minute and I'll have the deposit book ready for 
 you." 
 
 "You come from New York, sir, I believe," said the 
 Squire. 
 
 " Yes, that is my home," said Vance ; "at least as much 
 home as I have anywhere. But I have neither father nor 
 mother, sister nor brother, wife nor child. I have been a 
 wanderer all my days." 
 
 " You paint, don't you ? " 
 
 "Yes, I have studied many years abroad. I have not 
 been much in my own country, Squire, and I have often felt 
 ashamed of my own ignorance of it, so when I came over 
 this time I thought I would take a trip through New 
 England; and in my wanderings I heard of Pomfret and 
 came here. I am delighted with what I have seen of your 
 town. " 
 
 The door opened and Ethel Leslie came in, cloaked and 
 bonneted for a drive. 
 
 "Good by, papa," she said. "Mrs. Moore sent for me to 
 come to dinner and Benny's waiting at the gate to drive me 
 out." 
 
 " This is my daughter, Mr. Vance." 
 
 " I saw Miss Leslie in church yesterday." 
 
 "And we all noticed you too. We are still countrified 
 enough to take note of strangers." 
 
 " Will you be back to tea, daughter?"
 
 ARTHUR VAHCE. 1 
 
 "Yes, papa. Benny will drive me back." 
 
 " Then I shall be glad if you will drop in to tea/' said 
 the Squire to Vance; " seven o'clock, if you have nothing 
 better to do." 
 
 "I shall be delighted, I assure you. Permit me, Miss 
 Leslie, to hand you into your carriage." 
 
 In no wise reluctant to receive the polite attention of the 
 good-looking stranger, Ethel Leslie smiled acquiescence, and 
 he soon assisted her into the light buggy and tucked the 
 lap robe snugly about her. 
 
 Benny Moore was a connoisseur in horse flesh, and the 
 gray gelding which he drove struck a four-minute gait as 
 soon as the level road outside the town was reached. Then 
 relaxing his attention to his horse Benny looked around at 
 his companion. How pretty she looked. The wind had 
 blown her jaunty hat a little back from her forehead, had 
 freshened the bright color in her cheeks and had brought 
 a merry sparkle into her eyes and a smile around her lips. 
 
 " This is splendid, Benny," she said, noticing his glance of 
 admiration; " Duke grows faster every day." 
 
 " Who was he who helped you into the the buggy?" 
 
 " Mr. Vance. Don't you think he is handsome ?" 
 
 " Well, no; I don't like his looks." 
 
 Poor Benny; he was just in that condition of mind that 
 perceives in every unmarried man a possible rival. 
 
 " Nonsense," was Ethel's rejoinder, " you haven't really 
 seen him yet. He's to come to tea to-night, so you'll see him. 
 Because you'll stay to tea, you know, after you've driven me 
 back." 
 
 " Well, I don't know, you haven't asked me before." 
 
 " Nonsense; you know you are always to stay when you're 
 in town." 
 
 Did Ethel really know that Benny loved her ? Was she 
 really willing to keep him near her as long as possible, or
 
 52 THE fOMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 was she simply trying her power over the young fellow as 
 all women like to do ? Benny would have given much to 
 know. 
 
 " Where have I seen that cashier before/' said Vance to 
 himself as he wandered outside the town by the river's side 
 that afternoon. " It is not like me to forget faces, and I 
 have a notion that when I saw him 1 fixed him in my memory 
 to be remembered again. Pshaw ! It will come back to me 
 presently. Pretty little girl, the Squire's daughter. Wonder 
 if she's engaged to that young fellow in the buggy. I've a 
 great mind to make up to her myself. If she would marry 
 me we could settle down here and live happily and I would 
 gradually take the Squire's place. That would be a change 
 indeed. Some of my friends would hardly recognize me as 
 a bank-president." He seemed to be much amused at the 
 idea and laughed out loud. 
 
 All that afternoon he was unusually thoughtful, seem- 
 ing to avoid the company of those village folk whom he 
 met; but when evening came he remembered his engage- 
 ment and having dressed himself carefully he walked up to 
 the Squire's house at the appointed time. 
 
 He stood for a moment by the Squire's fence with his 
 hand upon the latch of the gate. There was a plan only 
 half formed in his mind, and he was trying to develop it. 
 He was roused from his reverie by a deep and savage growl, 
 and starting he saw in the path before him a dog, with his 
 hairs erect and bristling with anger. 
 
 " That confounded dog ! " he exclaimed. " Here's a go." 
 
 " Gr-rr-rr-rr ! " growled Eover, showing his teeth as if in 
 anger. 
 
 " Good doggie ! Poor fellow ! " Vance exclaimed as he 
 stepped forward keeping a watchful eye upon the animal. 
 
 " Gr-rr-rr-rr/' growled the dog again, backing away from 
 him.
 
 AETHUB VANCE. 53 
 
 " The idea of keeping such a brute as that about the house. 
 He must be got rid of somehow. He is too discerning a 
 beast to live/' Vance thought as with a feeling of relief he 
 saw the front door open. 
 
 " Your dog is not hospitable to strangers," he said to the 
 Squire, as they sat in the parlor later; " I was in doubt 
 whether he would allow me to accept your invitation to tea." 
 
 " He used to be very kind, but of late he seems to have 
 changed. We have a servant in the house to whom he will 
 not be civil. It is a pity, for he is a valuable dog," the 
 Squire answered. 
 
 " He has so many tricks too," Ethel said, " and will fetch 
 and carry to any store in the village. He is better than a 
 boy to run errands, for he never loiters." 
 
 At the tea table Vance rendered himself very entertain- 
 ing to the Squire and Ethel. He had a fund of anecdotes 
 which he opened for their amusement, and having been a 
 great traveler could talk well about foreign lands. He did 
 not, however, get along so well with Benny, who was quite 
 gruff and morose and evidently ill at ease. 
 
 " If you don't like him, Benny," Ethel said to her lover 
 as they stood., later in the evening, at the front gate, " that's 
 no reason why you should be rude to him." 
 
 " Indeed, Ethel, I could not help it." 
 
 "Couldn't help it!" 
 
 "Indeed I couldn't, Ethel" he pleaded. "Oh, Ethel, 
 there's something I've been wanting to tell you this long 
 time and now that that man has come I can't be silent any 
 longer. Ethel, I love you ! that's why I was rude to-night. 
 Forgive me." 
 
 " If you show your love the way you did to-night you had 
 better keep it to yourself," said Ethel crossly, for she was 
 really very angry with the way Benny had behaved. " When 
 you know how to act as a gentleman should, then perhaps 
 it will be time enough to talk about loving me/'
 
 54 THE POMFRET MYSTEBY. 
 
 " Good night, Ethel." That was all he said; but there were 
 tears in his eyes as he spoke, and then he leaped into his 
 buggy. Ethel looked after him listening until the sound 
 of his horse's hoof -beats died away in the distance. Perhaps 
 there was in her heart as she turned back to the house some 
 remorse for her cruelty to him. 
 
 "He had no right to be rude," she thought to herself, 
 perhaps in apology, as she entered the porch ; " still I am 
 sorry he went away as he did; but, never mind, he will be 
 back to-morrow all right." 
 
 Oh woman ! woman ! Do you ever know the worth of a 
 man's heart, till you have trampled upon it ! 
 
 As if in defiance of her own heart Ethel was recklessly 
 gay the rest of the evening. She played and sang and then 
 it was discovered that Vance sang too. So he gave them a 
 little Erench troubadour song set to English words, and 
 afterwards he and Ethel sang duets. It was late after 
 eleven o'clock very late for the country town, when Vance 
 took his leave, but he had sketched a portrait of the Squire 
 for Ethel and she had arranged to drive him six miles out 
 of town to a cool quiet picturesque glen where Israel Putnam 
 had shot the wolf. 
 
 " Come at nine o'clock," she said, as Vance left the Squire 
 and herself at the door. 
 
 And so it happened that the next morning when Benny 
 Moore came prepared to make his peace with his mistress 
 he learnt that she and the stranger had gone off on a long 
 ride together. 
 
 " Won't you stay and wait, Benny," said Aunt Martha, who 
 opened the door for him; " they'll be back at two o'clock." 
 
 " No ! " he said, kicking the door mat viciously; " I didn't 
 come to see her anyhow. I only came to get some books." 
 
 There was something about this man, whom we must now 
 call Arthur Vance, which Ethel's pure womanly instincts
 
 AKTHUR VANCE. 55 
 
 intuitively rebelled against, some strain in his soul that was 
 antagonistic to her; yet she found it impossible to resist the 
 charm and fascination of his manner. He had traveled 
 apparently in most of the foreign countries. He had learned 
 painting in France, singing in Italy; once he had even been 
 in Turkey. He was not unacquainted with Mexico and the 
 South American Republics. He had a fund of anecdotes, a 
 store of knowledge, which seemed endless. 
 
 It could hardly he expected that the inexperienced little 
 country girl could resist the fascinations of the experienced 
 and talented man of the world; nor that Benny, uncultured 
 in the ways of the world, should be able to stand against his 
 rivalry. Benny was handicapped also by the very strength 
 and purity of his passion. 
 
 Whatever may have been the intention of the stranger 
 when first he came to Pomfret it soon became evident that 
 now he stayed on in the hope of winning Ethel Leslie as his 
 wife. She little knew the meshes that were twining about 
 her; little knew that every act and word of hers were 
 watched and noted by one whose eyes were sharpened by 
 jealousy. To ordinary observers Adele would have seemed 
 engrossed in her work, but those of sharper insight would 
 have seen that she found time to linger near the room where 
 Vance was and became restless while he was in Ethel's 
 company. He himself noticed it at last and as a result the 
 meeting in the Park followed. 
 
 Adele made some excuse to go away. Her mother 
 was ill and she wished again to implore pardon and be for- 
 given. She did not expect to be gone more than a week or 
 at the utmost a fortnight and a farmer's daughter from 
 the country could do her work while she was away. 
 
 Arthur Vance felt relieved when she had gone and pressed 
 his suit with renewed vigor. 
 
 So before the summer ended Ethel Leslie and Arthur
 
 56 THE POMFKET MYSTEKY. 
 
 Vance were engaged to be married, and before the the winter 
 snows fell they were man and wife. 
 
 But it must not be supposed that the Squire consented to 
 the marriage before he knew something of Vance's ante- 
 cedents. Not at all. Vance had taken him to New York; 
 had introduced him to friends living there who vouched for 
 his respectability and wealth. 
 
 " I hardly know any one in this country/' Vance had said, 
 " I have been so long a wanderer. And only a few of my 
 father's old friends know me. But I will take you to them 
 and you can hear what they have to say." 
 
 And the Squire had gone to them and learned nothing but 
 good about Vance. 
 
 Benny had left Pomfret and was practicing law in New 
 York, but he came to the wedding. His heart was sick and 
 sore with wounded love, but he was determined that he 
 would give no signs of his anguish that his demeanoi 
 should be such as to give no cause of remark to any lookei 
 on. He cared not if Ethel divined it. He loved her so 
 well and was so sure of his own rectitude, that he always 
 hoped she would realize what bands were binding down his 
 love. But during the weeks that elapsed just before the 
 marriage he was graver and more silent than usual, sterner 
 perhaps, and at times when he was alone his face assumed 
 a look of pathetic sadness his heart seemed heavy. He 
 could take no pleasure in anything except in work, in that 
 alone could he forget part but not all of his terrible sorrow. 
 
 There are times in men's lives when sentiments and 
 affections must be crushed out with a relentless sternness. 
 There must be no temporizing nor delaying, no hesitation 
 nor doubt. But if their sentiments and affections are 
 true they are strong and deeply rooted and the tenderest 
 susceptibilities are wrenched and sprained in the process. 
 The struggle must be fought alone, A kind word, a sym-
 
 ARTHUR VANCE. 57 
 
 pathetic glance are all the aid that the truest, most deep- 
 seeing friend can offer. 
 
 Benny underwent this terrible struggle with his love. 
 He could not drown it, nor hide it, nor burn it. To starve 
 it to give it no food of word or glance or sigh or memories 
 of bygone days, not even a crumb of vain regret, that was 
 the way that the battle must be fought, that was the way 
 in which the surging passion of his love must be brought 
 into the calm current of friendship. And Benny set him- 
 self resolutely to the task. Many a time he wished that he 
 could die but death never comes when most desired, and 
 suicide he looked upon as cowardice. 
 
 He knew that the wedding cards were waiting for him at 
 his room, but he dreaded to go and get them. They were 
 in his eyes the warrant that doomed his love to death. It 
 was not until a few days before the wedding-day that he 
 took them and opened them, with no outward tremor but 
 with many a heartsick feeling in his soul. 
 
 And when after the wedding was over and he went back 
 to his father's house to spend the night he sat for many 
 hours with his hands covering his face and his frame trem- 
 bling, the hot scalding tears dropping slowly through his 
 fingers. It was the relaxation of the control which he had 
 set upon himself during the day. When at last he rose and 
 went to bed he felt that his love was not dead it could 
 never die, but it had been molded and shaped into a fervent 
 pure friendship. 
 
 The wedding day was dark and murky, and the rain came 
 down in showers from a dull leaden sky. The roads were 
 muddy and drops of water dripped from the leaves and 
 from every twig and leaf. But Benny's spirits seemed more 
 buoyant than usual. In the struggle between his natural 
 and his spiritual nature, it was the natural which craved aid 
 .from and was affected by nature; and the gloom of the
 
 58 THE POMFKET MYSTEKT. 
 
 weather seemed to harmonize with and subdue into a dull 
 lethargy his passionate regretful love, while his spirit, inde- 
 pendent of such surroundings, increased in power. 
 
 Great exertions must have their reactions, and Benny that 
 night slept the sleep of the weary. 
 
 CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 LALINE. 
 
 MOORE was a stranger in New York, and his prog- 
 ress in his profession, though ultimately rapid, was slow at 
 first. He had much leisure time upon his hands time 
 that occasionally he was much perplexed how best to 
 employ. He could not read dry law treatises and drier 
 law reports all the while. The theater he had no fondness 
 for and to read novels he considered a waste of time. So 
 he turned to composition. 
 
 His stories had a considerable circulation in manuscript 
 none of them, however, saw the glory of print. 
 
 He was unknown in literary circles, and until he had 
 achieved a reputation no editor desired his contributions. 
 
 One story, in particular, he was proud of, and in later 
 years he would sometimes read it to a trusted friend. With 
 all its faults and it may have many indeed the lurid style (a 
 style known among some authors as the "slop-over" style) 
 may be condemned it nevertheless gives an insight into the 
 chaotic condition into which Benny's mind had been thrown 
 by the incidents of his previous years an illustration of the 
 manner in which his imagination ran riot after the severe 
 repression and stern discipline of the law studies and a 
 record of his life in these years would be incomplete were 
 it- omitted,.
 
 LALLSTE. 59 
 
 And so the story which he wrote and called " Laline," 
 is given here as a part of his history. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 Oh how I loved her. Madly, wildly, passionately ! I loved 
 as man never loved before ! 
 
 Even in the days of my childhood my whole heart, my 
 whole soul, was given up to her. Her face rose before me 
 as I lay wrapped in reverie among the woods in summer 
 days, and she came to me in my dreams at night. I was 
 sad when she seemed sad and joyous when she seemed to 
 smile. 
 
 I was but a child when the spell was first cast over me. 
 Twelve quiet, uneventful years, checkered only with the 
 joys and the sharp but fleeting sorrows of childhood years 
 that lacked all appreciation of the charm of romance and 
 the excitement of tragedy had passed, measuring the span 
 of my life, when all my nature was convulsed and changed 
 by the fascination of a fierce, blind love. Thenceforth sun- 
 shine and shadow had a new meaning for me, and the future 
 ceased to be a name and became a reality which I longed to 
 explore. 
 
 Yet the image, whose enchantment I was under then, 
 was but a phantom from the land of shadows a picture 
 the portrait of a fair woman, on darkened and time-stained 
 canvas. 
 
 My childish days had been barren of the friendships that 
 usually gladden the springtime of life. I was an orphan, 
 living alone in the country, with two maiden aunts, in an 
 old homestead that had been in the family for generations. 
 I was the last male of my race. The well -tilled fields- about 
 the old mansion were the remnants of my ancestral fortune. 
 But in our poverty we were very proud, for the Delameures 
 had been a famous race in bygone years and from my earlj-
 
 60 THE POMFEET MYSTEEY. 
 
 est days I had heard legends of their former grandeur. In- 
 stead of the usual nursery tales my mind had been nurtured 
 with family traditions, and I learned the alphabet from a 
 quaint parchment roll that set forth, with heraldic blazon- 
 ings, the many generations of the Delameures. 
 
 I was without the companionship of other children, for 
 we were too poor to entertain visitors and I was not allowed 
 to -associate with the children of the vicinage. It was a 
 bad training for a lad who, sooner or later, must go forth 
 into the wide world to earn his own living; but the pride 
 and solicitude of my aunts could not bear that I should be 
 reared as the neighboring children of coarser fiber were, 
 and the charges of distant schools were far beyond our 
 humble means. 
 
 Living, thus, much alone, I made playmates of my 
 thoughts and the familiar objects in and around the house. 
 I peopled certain dark corners with terrors, and thought 
 that the fairies had their home amid the embers of the fire 
 that glowed on the hearth in winter nights. 
 
 Our poverty had not reached that depth of degradation 
 that the relics and heirlooms of the family had been sold 
 or dispersed. The antique silver still reposed safely in the 
 stone vault in the cellar, whence, twice a year, it was taken 
 and cleaned; the ancient eggshell china and quaint willow 
 pattern service yet stood on the shelves of the china closet, 
 and the family portraits still hung upon the walls. We 
 clung to these relics of former prosperity with a supersti- 
 tious reverence, and I verily believe that my aunts would 
 have died sooner than part with one article of this super- 
 fluous luxury. 
 
 As for me, in those childish days, I valued these things 
 but little. Far more important, to my mind, than the heir- 
 looms of silverware, was the dark vault where they were 
 kept. All the hobgoblins and grim specters which my
 
 lALWE. 61 
 
 fancy conjured had their abiding place within those stone 
 walls. 
 
 Sometimes at night I dreamed that the thick oaken doors 
 of the vault swung open mysteriously and that there rushed 
 out a troop of grinning goblin faces and distorted forms, 
 which swept, in ghostly procession, through the deserted 
 corridors of the house and clustered, in the darkness, around 
 my bed. 
 
 The antique china was to me simply something which I 
 should never handle, but the pictures were my friends. I 
 knew the histories of all the dead and forgotten Delameures 
 whose protraits scowled or simpered at me through the dark 
 varnish that shrouded their canvases, and I wandered in 
 imagination through the landscapes that stretched away for 
 indefinite distances behind their frames of tarnished gilt. 
 
 The old garret, with its cobwebs and its dust and its in- 
 valided and discarded furniture, its chests full of ancient 
 finery, its thousand and one odds and ends that accumulate 
 in every old garret, was, for me, a mine of the richest 
 treasures. 
 
 It was in this dim, cobwebby, storehouse of the past that 
 I first saw the face of the woman who was to be all the 
 world to me ; who was to raise me to Heaven and plunge 
 me into Hell ; who was to torment and delight me, to 
 soothe and wound me, to give me life and then to lead me 
 to a bitter unendurable death. 
 
 It was an old portrait of the fairest woman that ever lived. 
 
 I dragged it forth from the pile of lumber where it had 
 lain for years, and bearing it, as best I could, to the small- 
 paned gable window I carefully brushed the dust from its 
 dim canvas. Out of the dusky, dark background a face of 
 surpassing loveliness smiled up at me. Child as I was, I 
 felt the wondrous power of its beauty. Over my soul swept 
 a wave of irresistible passion, and I fell upon my knees before 
 it in frenzied adoration.
 
 62 THE POMFRET MYSTE&Y. 
 
 I took no heed of the flight of time as I knelt there 
 wrapped in ardent homage, of that wondrous face ; but it 
 was dark when the voice of Aunt Margaret, calling my 
 name, roused me from my trance, and, with a strange feel- 
 ing of exaltation in my heart, I went down to every-day 
 commonplace life. 
 
 But no ! Life was never again to be commonplace to me. 
 A sentiment had been awakened a spell had been woven 
 that held my heart and soul subservient to their enchant- 
 ment, and cast a glamour over every act and thought. 
 
 " Aunt Margaret," said I, as I sat at the table eating the 
 bread and milk that formed my evening repast; "Aunt 
 Margaret, who is the lovely lady whose portrait is upstairs 
 in the garret ? " 
 
 Aunt Margaret glanced at Aunt Betsy with a strange, 
 scared look, and hesitated before she answered: 
 
 " What portrait do you mean, Percy?" 
 
 " A portrait that I found in the garret a portrait of a 
 lady oh so beautiful ! With long yellow hair streaming 
 down her back, and beautiful, great, blue eyes." 
 
 The fair face, in all its loveliness, rose before my imagina- 
 tion as I spoke. 
 
 " It is Laline 1 " said Aunt Betsy, in hushed, awestruck 
 tones more to Aunt Margaret than to me. " He has seen 
 Laline ! " 
 
 " Who is Laline ? " I asked, glancing with a vague, intui- 
 tive alarm in the ashen faces of the old aunts. Aunt Martha 
 answered, with trembling lips and faltering voice : 
 
 " Laline was an ancestress of ours, Percy, in the days when 
 the Delameures were a noble family of France. It is her por- 
 trait that you have found. There was another Laline, one 
 hundred years ago, so like the first Laline in form and face 
 that the same painting served as a likeness of them both. 
 When you are twenty-one years old you will be told more 
 about her. "
 
 LALIKE. 63 
 
 I dreamt of the face that night it was never absent from 
 my mind from the time that my eyes closed until they 
 opened again in the morning. But, when I went to the 
 garret again, the portrait was gone. 
 
 I rushed down stairs with a heart filled with anguish, and 
 implored Aunt Margaret to tell me what had been done with 
 it. She had not intended to disclose its hiding place to me, 
 but my evident distress shook her resolution, and she in- 
 formed me that it had been put for safe keeping in the 
 vault where the silver was stored. 
 
 They thought I cried because I could not see the picture 
 that I was a child lamenting a lost plaything but my 
 tears were not shed for these reasons. I wept because a 
 wild, terrible despair came over me at the thought of that 
 fair image locked up among the execrable horrors with 
 which I had peopled the vault. 
 
 I rushed from the house and sought the shelter of the 
 warm, fragrant hay in the mow of the barn. It was my 
 favorite refuge when childish misfortunes came, and many 
 a tribulation had I sobbed over there, until the perfume of 
 the odorous hay, the cooing of the pigeons on the rafters 
 overhead, the "twit-twit/' of swallows flying in and out 
 , through holes under the caves, had beguiled the current of 
 my thoughts and I had grown gay again. But to-day a 
 thick shadow of woe had settled over me which the cooing 
 of the pigeons and the "twit-twit" of the swallows were 
 powerless to dispel. The brightness had gone out of my 
 life, and it seemed to me that I could never be happy again. 
 
 I stole unseen into the cellar and lay down on the hard, 
 damp floor before the doors of the vault. My tears ran fast, 
 but my moans were hushed, for I feared to be discovered. I 
 whispered words of love ^-of passionate sympathy with my 
 lips close to the damp iron-bound doors as if my voice could 
 penetrate the thick, oaken planks into the dark hollow 
 beyond.
 
 64 THE FOMFfcET It? STERY. 
 
 I was delirious with passionate despair. I could not eat 
 nor sleep, and at last they were forced to unlock the doors 
 and bring forth the precious portrait. Then I was mad 
 with joy, and I knelt before it and kissed its lips again and 
 again in the frenzy of passion. I was bewitched I was 
 not a simple child I was a creature mad with the spells of 
 an overpowering, resistless enchantment. 
 
 At last, when the ecstatic paroxysm of my joy was over, I 
 let them bring the portrait upstairs into the hall. They 
 placed it where the light fell full upon it and then, Aunt 
 Margaret, taking me by the hand, said: 
 
 " See, Percy, there is no picture here nothing but a dark 
 expanse broken by shadows. There is no face." 
 
 I stared up into Aunt Martha's face in amazement. " No 
 face ! " when the soft eyes were beaming brighter than ever 
 into mine and the rosy lips seemed to be breaking into a 
 smile as the sunlight played over them. 
 
 " Oh, Aunt Margaret, how can you say that/' I cried 
 and I bent down over the portrait and with my finger 
 reverently traced the outlines of the face 
 
 "See!" I exclaimed, "here are the eyes, here is the 
 yellow hair, here is the mouth ' ' and as I touched the red, 
 smiling lips they seemed to press against my finger tips in a 
 warm loving kiss " here is the curve of the cheek. How 
 can you say that there is no face here ! " 
 
 But my words were all in vain. No one but me could 
 discern the wonderful face. It was mine mine alone and 
 I loved it more earnestly, more passionately, more despair- 
 ingly than ever. 
 
 I look back on those days with a strange surprise. I 
 wonder if I was not, in truth, mad ! In all things save one 
 I was a child, but in that one in my love I was a man 
 nay more than a man ! I was a god for humanity could 
 not fathom the depths of the seething fires of passion that 
 burned within me.
 
 LALINE. <J5 
 
 It was in vain that my aunts strove to disillusion me by 
 repeated assertions that the picture was but a blank that 
 no face nor features could be traced upon its blackened 
 canvas that I was worshiping a creature of my fancy, a 
 phantasm of my brain. I could not be convinced. My 
 reason could not resist the spell cast upon it. My heart 
 could not renounce the idol before which it had prostrated 
 itself. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 So the years of childhood passed away and I came to 
 man's estate but manhood brought me no relief. At night 
 and at day there came before me the vision of that phantom 
 from the land of shadows, growing more fair, more tran- 
 scendentally beautiful as the years passed by, and tinging 
 the deepest depths of my nature with a weird, mingled 
 melancholy and joy. 
 
 I was twenty-one. The time had come when I must put 
 childish things away and be a man. I must go out into the 
 world and begin the great battle of life. I must put the 
 past behind me and live for the future. I was twenty- 
 one. 
 
 Time, which in its flight had measured out to me a 
 generous proportion of inches of height and girth, had dealt 
 lightly with my maiden aunts. Their forms were perhaps 
 a trifle less erect than they had been in the year when I had 
 found the fair face that I loved among the lumber in the 
 garret; their hair perhaps a trifle more silvery white, their 
 steps less firm and sure ; but their love had undergone no 
 change. They loved me as women love the one sole creature 
 given them to love yet what was their love for me com- 
 pared with mine for that fair face with the beaming eyes, 
 the flowing yellow hair and the rosy lips. 
 
 I was twenty-one, and among the events which the day 
 3
 
 66 THE KJMfRKf MYSTERY. 
 
 brought in its train was the disclosure to me of the family 
 tradition of Laline. 
 
 I have said that the Delameures were a proud race and 
 an ancient, but before this day I had not known that we 
 traced our race far back to the days before the Caesarian 
 legions conquered the theretofore untamed Gaulic tribes 
 the fierce, wild days when France was but a wilderness 
 peopled by savage bands. We were a noble race then, as 
 we have been since, furnishing warriors and priests, and 
 knowing vicissitudes and prosperities that alternate in every 
 ancient family; but from the earliest time the race had 
 never been extinct. Time and time again the male lino 
 had contracted into one sole representative even as it had 
 now, when I, in the whole world, was the sole heritor of my 
 ancestors but as often had that one man stemmed the ad- 
 verse tide of fortune and given new life and vigor to the 
 family. 
 
 Now, when I was twenty-one, the old documents that told 
 the tale of past triumphs and past decadence were put into 
 my hands and I was bidden to read them through. 
 
 I had partitioned off a part of the old garret the part 
 where I, years before, had found the picture as a sitting 
 room, sacred to myself, and had equipped it with such fur- 
 niture as I could find among the lumber of the house. I 
 had hung the portrait on the wall where the light through 
 the narrow window shone full upon it, and here I had 
 come, to study or to dream as the mood was upon me; tell- 
 ing my sorrows and my joys, my hopes, my aspirations and my 
 fears, to the sweet face that looked so sympathizingly down 
 upon me. Here on the anniversary of the day of my birth, 
 I brought the ancient package that was to tell me the secret 
 history of my race, and sitting down beside the portrait, as 
 one might sit by the side of a loved and trusted friend, I 
 opened the yellow folds and my eyes traced the quaint letter- 
 ing on the parchments.
 
 LALINE. 67 
 
 It was a calm, clear morning. The sun had not yet 
 reached the zenith, and his beams cast a flood of light over 
 the familiar objects surrounding me. I smelt the perfume 
 of the budding floAvers, the odors of the growing clover in 
 the fields; I heard the buzzing of the bees as they flew 
 hither and thither among the vines that clambered over the 
 piazza below. There were dark clouds on the horizon, but 
 my senses took no note of them. I was engrossed in the 
 old manuscripts that were spread open before me. 
 
 The tale began with a short sketch of the narrator's life 
 and closed with a curse upon such of his descendants as 
 should neglect the warning of the narrative; but between 
 the opening and the closing was a tale that sent my blood 
 leaping through my veins in wild pulsations of joy and 
 then in alternation filled me with dire dread and terror. 
 
 It was written in a clear hand, in ancient French, and I 
 knew then why I had been so carefully trained in that lan- 
 guage foreign to our own English tongue. 
 
 It was a Sunday morning, that morning of my twenty- 
 first birthday, and all the household save myself had gone 
 to church, while I was left alone to study these records of 
 dead and gone progenitors. I heard the chime of the church 
 bells mellowed into faintness by the intervening distance as 
 I broke the seals and untied the faded strings that bound 
 the parchment sheets together. The old unbelief of my 
 savage ancestry must have come back to me at that hour, for 
 well I remember that, as the far-off bells fell upon my ear, 
 I rose and kissed the lips of the portrait as if to evince by 
 my actions the feeling in my heart that the fair creature 
 within the tarnished picture-frame was all the God or re- 
 ligion that I cared for or worshiped. 
 
 I read on ; and soon my thoughts lost all appreciation of 
 the present and were engrossed with the narrative before 
 me. I read how Dagobert De L'Armeure had found him-
 
 68 THE rOMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 self homeless and kinless; and how, in the pride and despair 
 of his heart, he had sought the last survivor of the ancient 
 Druid priests and, with unholy rites and incantations, vowed 
 a strange and cruel vow, whereby he and his descendants, 
 on whom the continuation of the race depended, were ever 
 to renew the glory of the race and were doomed to pay 
 therefor by an awful, terrible death. And fortune came 
 ever in the guise of a fair woman whom men called Laline 
 and who bore children and brought wealth, and at whose 
 hand the devoted scion of the race would suffer death. 
 
 A fearful picture, full of suggestive terror rose before my 
 shuddering fancy as I spelled out the almost illegible manu- 
 script. 
 
 I seemed to be in imagination a spectator at the awful 
 scene. The room faded from my consciousness. In place 
 of the rafters of the roof, the brown, gnarled branches of . v 
 oaks stretched over my head. Instead of the wooden floor 
 my feet rested upon the soft, green moss of the forest. The 
 walls vanished and I saw the leafy aisles of the woods, 
 stretching away until they were lost in the indefinite dis- 
 tance. 
 
 It was night, but the full moon shed a flood of silver light 
 over the earth by which I hastily discerned these things, 
 while my attention centered on a group about a fire that 
 blazed under the branches of a gigantic oak-tree. 
 
 An old man, a priest, with long, white flowing hair and 
 beard, and clad in loose, fantastic garments, held aloft in 
 one hand a golden knife and in the other a branch of mistle- 
 toe which he had just lopped from its parent stem. Behind 
 him were two white bulls held fast by fierce and unkempt 
 savage men. On one side was a knight, partly clad in 
 armor, but unhelmeted. Before him lay the figure of a 
 child, bound with green withes and leathern thongs. The 
 lurid flames of the fire threw a crimson glow over all.
 
 LALINE. 69 
 
 Helpless, motionless, palsied with terror, I stood, an un- 
 seen witness of the frightful spectacle. I watched the priest 
 plunge the golden knife into the body of the child. The 
 victim's despairing, agonized death-shriek rang in my ears 
 while I saw his yet pulsing heart torn from his body. I 
 saw the white bulls slaughtered by the golden knife ; and 
 I heard the priest utter strange words and incantations as 
 he mixed the smoking blood of the human victim and the 
 red fluid from the veins of the groaning beasts with shrec 3 
 of the mistletoe and leaves of other plants. 
 
 Then there was brought forth into the scene something 
 that had escaped my notice previously an osier basket filled 
 with the writhing, tangled forms of squirming snakes. 
 Their sinuous bodies writhed and twisted in convulsive 
 agonies as they fought a deadly battle within the narrow 
 confines of their cage. Their open gorges were red and 
 bloody, their eyes scintillated with hate and fury. The 
 froth from their venomous jaws and the slime from their 
 distorted bodies were churned into a foam by their ceaseless 
 motions. Suddenly, from the writhing mass, there sprung 
 a white, oval object; and, as it rose into the air, I saw the 
 priest seize it and plunge it into the hellish mixture which 
 he had brewed. 
 
 Then, without warning, the flames of the fire died down; 
 thick clouds scurried across the face of the moon; a deep, 
 moaning sound that seemed to be resonant with inarticulate 
 words swept through the forest as if the oaks had found 
 voice and were muttering enchantments. As the light faded 
 and grew dim I saw the knight drink off the devilish potion. 
 
 Then all was dark again. And then, after a moment's 
 pause, I found myself sitting in my familiar room, with the 
 yellow parchment spread open before me. 
 
 I read on. 
 
 I read how Jean De L'Armeure, reading, as I now read,
 
 70 THE POMFEET MYSTEET. 
 
 on the morning of his twenty-first birthday, the dire destiny 
 that hung over him, had fled from the pleasures of the world 
 and sought a refuge in a holy monastery. But the rites of 
 the Church had been powerless to break the spell of the 
 ancient enchantment. The fair woman Laline came and 
 claimed her victim. The race of the De L'Armeures flour- 
 ished again and he died with all the agonies of a lost soul. 
 
 I read how a second Jean, dreading the awful fate that 
 threatened him, had fled from the fair land of France to the 
 unsettled wilds of America; but the spell had followed him 
 across the sea and the doom had fallen upon him. 
 
 And I knew then, that I, the sole survivor of the Dela- 
 meures, in direct male descent, would find my destiny ready 
 made for me. 
 
 The fair, summer morning had passed while I was study- 
 ing over the ancient parchments, but I sat with my head 
 bent down, the yellow sheets clutched fast in my hand and 
 my mind wrapped in a bitter rebellious reverie at the fore- 
 ordination of my fate. 
 
 Suddenly a loud thunder peal aroused me. To my ex- 
 cited imagination it seemed like a demoniac trumpet-peal 
 heralding the advent of my horrible doom. 
 
 I started to my feet; and as I did so, I felt the old house 
 quiver under the sudden downpour of the rain and the 
 fierce gusts of the storm wind. I trembled with terror and 
 with awe as the darkness deepened, until in the glare of a 
 sharp, quick flash of lightning my eyes fell upon the por- 
 trait on the wall and I saw the fair face, instinct with life, 
 smiling upon me. In an instant all my terror and agony 
 came upon me with redoubled vehemence. I threw myself 
 prostrato before the picture, as the heathen grovels before 
 his idol, and poured out a torrent of wild, hot, passionate 
 love such as man never spake before. 
 
 The darkness deepened as I lay there. The wind seemed
 
 LALINE. 71 
 
 to be laden with articulate words in an unoouth and bar- 
 barous tongue, as if some malignant power of the air some 
 evil spirit of the storm was muttering spells and weaving 
 enchantments about me. My words came wilder, faster, 
 more passionately from my lips, as lifting up my arms 
 towards the place where I knew the picture was, I pleaded, 
 more earnestly than erer man pled for life, with the fair 
 face to succor me. I know not what words I said. I was 
 frenzied with love and fear. But in my anguish my voice 
 rose in volume and intensity I called aloud, until the old 
 house re-echoed, above the noise of the storm, with my wild 
 prayers and adjurations. 
 
 In the quick, sharp glitter of the lightning flashes, that 
 momentarily split the darkness asunder with synchronous 
 thunder-peal, I beheld changing emotions flit over the fair 
 face on the canvas, as if my wild words were awaking the 
 slumbering chords of life in the breast of the fair spirit 
 which I was conjuring. 
 
 Suddenly, as it seemed to me, the noise of the tempest 
 died away in the distance and I heard the soft, faint strains 
 of far-off music blending with the dying tumult of the 
 storm, tremulous with the patter of raindrops, quivering 
 with the dying sobs of the wind, thrilling with the harmo- 
 nies of reviving Nature, rising and falling in undulating 
 waves of sound, as if celestial melodies were sweeping clown, 
 from the immeasurable space of heaven, to the earth. 
 
 The lessening gloom dimly disclosed the shadowy forms 
 of the familiar objects in the room, but my eyes were rivetted, 
 in an agony of apprehension, on the canvas of the picture 
 for the fair face had faded away and a dull black expanse 
 only met my eager gaze. I had been buoyant with blissful 
 expectation, born of the celestial harmonies, but now my 
 heart sank with an utter abandonment of hope as the thought 
 burned into my brain that I had lost all that had made life 
 desirable.
 
 73 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 I turned away with a gesture of despair, but halted as 
 it changed to stone at the sight which fell upon my eyes. 
 A woman divinely fair stood in the glare of the golden sun- 
 light that streamed through the window. Motionless as 
 I was, with scarce a pulsation of my heart, with my very 
 breathing checked, I nevertheless noted every detail of her 
 face and figure. She stood with the golden sunbeams fall- 
 ing caressingly about her, while through the window I could 
 see the horizon of dark clouds broken by the glinting streaks 
 of jagged lightning flashes, the celadon sky framed with 
 the iridescent arch of the rainbow. She stood gazing at me 
 with a look of ineffable tenderness; her rosy lips parted with 
 a loving smile; her blue eyes still moist and glistening with 
 tears of sympathy for my suffering; her long yellow hair 
 falling about her form and tremulous Avith the gentle undu- 
 lations of her breast, as if the sunbeams, which it rivaled 
 in hue, were entangled there and were gently stirring it in 
 their endeavors to get free. 
 
 She was the vision that had come to me in my dreams, 
 the face that had looked at me, and me only, out of the dull 
 canvas of the old painting; but no longer a phantom of 
 sight or mind, but flesh and blood, fairer than painter's 
 brush might paint or mind imagine. 
 
 She came to my side as I stood spell-bound at her loveli- 
 ness, and said to me in low, soft tones of incomparable 
 sweetness: 
 
 " See what your love has done. It has brought me to 
 your side. You need no longer waste your heart upon a 
 shadow. "We will go out into the world together you and I 
 we will go where it is always sunshine and where clouds 
 never come." 
 
 I could not speak my heart was too fall of joy for utter- 
 ance, as hand in hand we passed out of the house and walked 
 away over the green, moist fields, with the gentle breeze
 
 LALIUE. 78 
 
 dropping about us the odors which it had winnowed from 
 bush, and bud, and flower. 
 
 PART III. 
 
 The memory of that journey is like a dream to me. I was 
 in a trance of ecstatic bliss. The warm touch of that soft 
 hand clasped in mine, with every pulsation thrilled me 
 anew with a strange exaltation. I remember that the 
 landscape flew by like the vision of a dream that the 
 flowers had never seemed as fair the sky never so blue 
 the wind, never so odorous that the birds sang more sweetly 
 than birds ever sang before that I had no thought for aught 
 else than the ineffable joy which filled my soul Avith ecstacy 
 that my feet seemed to be winged that I was a creature 
 of Heaven and not of earth. 
 
 Then there is a space that memory fills only with the 
 rapture of the immensity of my love. 
 
 Then, I remember, I was a rich man in a great city, and 
 that Laline the fair creature that my love had created 
 that my adoration had brought to life was my wife. 
 
 Yes, the intermediary time is a blank to me ! As I look 
 back at it, it seems to be an interval, filled with the bright- 
 est gleamings of sunlight, with colors rich as those with 
 which the rainbow curves the sky, tuneful with the sweetest 
 harmonies, glorious with all that is fair and beautiful but 
 it is indefinite and indistinct. Its days are shrouded by a 
 golden radiant mist, which, as I strive to recall them to 
 mind, makes my pulses leap, my heart sing, and the blood 
 bound quicker through my veins. 
 
 That time seems to me like a dream and yet, more 
 real than a dream, for I realize that I have lived through 
 it; that it has been an actuality of my life; that the vague- 
 ness that hangs over it is but the outcome of excessive joy, that
 
 74 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 my mind basked blindly and automatically in the joy which 
 it could not analyze nor define. 
 
 Fortune smiled on me. Every venture that I entered 
 into succeeded. Gradually I began to accumulate vast 
 riches. Yet throughout those years of my life, I realized 
 vaguely intuitivley that a power, stronger than my own 
 will, was guiding me. I was the blind instrument of its 
 decrees. I was powerless to resist what it ordained. 
 
 It was in my home-life that I realized most acutely the 
 total annihilation of myself. Those days of overwhelming 
 bliss seem now to me, as I look back at them, unreal in the 
 intensity of their actualities of happiness. Laline the 
 wondrous woman the impersonification of indescribable 
 loveliness the embodiment of all that is beautiful in 
 humanity Lalino was by my side ! 
 
 Wealth came to me without my exerting even an effort 
 of will to acquire it, but while Laline bore me her company 
 I had no wish for aught else save her presence. 
 
 I had loved the fair face of the portrait with a passion 
 that words cannot describe, but I loved the living woman 
 with an intensity that was immeasurable, with a fervor 
 that my soul could not define. 
 
 Ah, wo were happy happy beyond the expression of 
 words in those days. Children then were born to us 
 children that sickness seemed powerless to harm. The 
 wealth that was to be their inheritance flowed in upon us 
 in a steady stream. 
 
 So the years passed all too quickly without a cloud to 
 mar the brightness of our happiness or to cast a shadow over 
 our bliss. They were happy years and left but slender 
 records. Grief and despair may be defined in words, but 
 language is too weak to paint the feverish ecstasy of joy. 
 
 Years passed and I grew old; but time was powerless to 
 deteriorate the wondrous beauty of Laline, or to lessen the
 
 LALIXE. 75 
 
 passionate admiration with which my heart prostrated itself 
 before her. Years passad; but they were so many chains 
 linking me firmer to the fair woman who had taken rny 
 heart from me years ago who never changed except to 
 grow more lovely. 
 
 Half of love's sweetness is the pain it brings yet Laline 
 had brought me never a sensation of distress. Half of love's 
 pain comes from the haunting fear that the future may rob 
 us of our happiness and yet the future was never in my 
 thoughts. The pres3nt was too full of joy for me to past 
 beyond it. My love seemed like eternity, no present, past 
 nor future could bound its immensity the sun of happi- 
 ness could never set upon it the sweetness of summer 
 could never depart from it ! 
 
 So the years passed and I grew old. I was rich and the 
 Delameure name was famous again. 
 
 Then Laline expressed a wish to visit with me those 
 ancient lands in France, which in years gone by had ac- 
 knowledged the sway of the Delameures. How could I 
 deny her I who hung upon her every breath whose heart 
 leaped with ecstatic joy at her smile whose lips quivered 
 and whose eyes grew moist if she were grave how could I 
 deny her the fulfillment of her wish ? She should go abroad 
 as queens, in olden time, went to their feudatories. Wealth 
 should surround her with all the pomp that rank had com- 
 manded in past epochs. Her journey should be a triumphal 
 progress of the Delameures to the laud of their ancestors. 
 She should become more famous than woman ever was 
 before. The nations of the old world should see her tran- 
 scendent beauty and worship her, even as I did. 
 
 But when I voiced my aspirations she said them nay. 
 We would go alone, she said, looking up at me with her 
 radiant smile; we would go alone she and I the love 
 which had waked her into life would be sufficient for her- 
 she asked nothing more.
 
 76 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 So we went abroad she and I, alone and together we 
 explored the ancient domains of the Delameures. The 
 broad acres which they had owned had long ago passed into 
 the hands of strangers, and the castle which they had built 
 had been torn down, and a stately pleasure house in the 
 modern style built in its stead; but the foundations of the 
 ancient structure were still extant, and Laline and I, hand 
 in hand, explored them. 
 
 It had seemed to me as if my bliss was beyond the power 
 of increase, but now it culminated in an ecstasy of happiness 
 that was beyond all compare, and Laline grew more won- 
 drously and radiantly beautiful. 
 
 Down under the earth we found a long-forgotten dungeon. 
 A narrow opening let in just air enough to keep alive the 
 prisoner immured therein, but no ray of sunlight ever pene- 
 trated into its damp, somber interior. We found it one day 
 when we had threaded the intricacies of subterranean laby- 
 rinths of passages and stairways. I looked at it with a dim, 
 half -familiar sense of recognition yet there could be no 
 chance that I had ever visited it before. 
 
 Suddenly there dawned upon me a remembrance that 
 there had been in the ancient parchments which I had read 
 on that eventful day when Laline had emerged from the 
 dim unreality of the portrait and stood by my side a creature 
 of flesh and blood, a description of the cell where Jean De 
 L'Armeure had met the doom which fate resistless fate 
 had held in store for him. 
 
 This was the place. I bent down over the damp floor as 
 if to search for stains of his life-blood. 
 
 Suddenly I heard the clang of an iron gate behind me 
 and looking up I saw the gleam of Laline's white arm as she 
 let it fall from the iron bars of a thickly grated door, before 
 unseen, which she had swung to behind me. 
 
 I was a prisoner I
 
 LALINE. 77 
 
 I felt no fear, for instantaneously I noticed that Laline 
 was on the other side. I looked upon it as some frolicsome 
 whim of hers. I supposed that she had shut me in, in play, 
 and that she would pretend to detain me for a few minutes 
 and then let me free. So I waited, fearlessly, patiently. 
 
 Blind fool that I was, the doom of the Delameures had 
 overtaken me and I knew it not ! The vow of Dagobert was 
 about to be accomplished ! The race of the Delameures 
 was restored to wealth and honor and my life was to be the 
 priceless payment. 
 
 I came to he grating that shut me out from the world. 
 The torch that I had stuck in a crevice of the passage, before 
 entering the dungeon, seemed to burn with a dim and 
 epulchral glare, and the damp, lifeless air was growing 
 heavy with the black smoke from the resinous compound. 
 A strange fear came over me. The form of Laline seemed 
 to be fading from my sight. I shook the iron bars with 
 superhuman strength, but they resisted all my efforts and 
 remained firm. 
 
 I cried aloud; " Laline ! Laline ! Let me out ! Let me 
 out, Laline ! " 
 
 Then there came to my ears the murmer of a so.t, low 
 voice, that I knew to be Laline's, though it was broken by 
 sobs and tremulous with tears. 
 
 " Alas ! Alas ! I may not free you ! I am but the minister 
 of fate the instrumentality that lured you blindly hither, 
 that the doom of the Delameures might be accomplished. 
 
 my love ! my love ! " the voice rose into passionate wail- 
 ings " My love ! My love ! Forgive oh forgive me ! I 
 have come to many of your race before I came to you, bnt 
 
 1 have loved none, I have been loved by none, as I hare 
 loved and been loved by you ! Oh my love ! My love; for- 
 give rne ! oh forgive me ! " 
 
 I could see the tears glistening on her pale cheeks, the
 
 78 THE POMFItET MYSTERY. 
 
 first tears that I had seen in those lovely eyes since they had 
 wept in sympathy for my sorrows when years before I had 
 arisen from prostration before the portrait that no longer 
 limned her lovely features I saw her arms stretched out 
 towards me in a passionate gesture of hopeless yearning and 
 despair. 
 
 I cried aloud until my throat was hoarse and voiceless. I 
 beat the bars until my hands were raw and the iron sanguine 
 with my blood. I fell upon my knees and I prayed yes, 
 for the first time in forty years I prayed but it was all in 
 vain the iron bars moved not. 
 
 Then, inch by inch, I searched my cell, hoping to find 
 hidden some secret exit, but all my endeavors were in vain. 
 
 Then once more I called upon Laline for help. I bade 
 her remember the happy hours we had spent together, the 
 love I had borne for her I know not what I said, for I was 
 beside myself in an agony of apprehension. 
 
 The red glow of the torch seemed to expand into a hngh 
 fire. Its jutting flames became the crimson fangs of ser- 
 pents. I saw their eyes gleam venomously at me as their 
 writhing forms rose up into the smoke and came curling and 
 twisting toward me. I felt their slimy, scaly bodies wind- 
 ing their loathsome sinuosities about me, wreathing them- 
 selves among my hair, binding my limbs with living manacles. 
 
 Then came oblivion. And then returning consciousness 
 of sound and motion ; and then thought and shuddering 
 terror. 
 
 The torch had burned itself away. 
 
 Time passed, but I could not measure its flight. Night 
 and day were alike in that fateful dungeon deep in the 
 ground. There Avas a faint, luminous glow that dimly dis- 
 closed the limits of my tomb, but darkness would have been 
 less hard to bear than that ghastly, sepulchral light that 
 sufficed only to reveal the horrors that encompassed nie.
 
 LALISTE. 79 
 
 I thought of the fair fields overhead; of the great arch 
 of the clear blue sky; of the fair flowers; the green grass; the 
 murmuring brook that rippled over the pebbles of its bed 
 and laughed and danced merrily in the sunlight; I thought 
 of the leafy boughs of the trees, slowly swaying from side to 
 side as the soft breeze rustled through them; of the tune- 
 ful birds that twittered among the flower-laden shrubs but 
 instead of the songs of the _Virds, I heard only the sobbing 
 moans of Laline, in the outer darkness beyond the grating 
 of my cell instead of the odorous fragrance of the flowers, 
 I smelt the close musty scent of a charnel-house instead 
 of the rippling streams I saw the damp moisture, oozing 
 slowly down the walls and in place of the blue vaults of 
 heaven and the leafy branches of the trees my eyes fell upon 
 the slimy stones of my dungeon. 
 
 I flung mysalf prone upon the damp floor and wept aloud. 
 I scratched at the flinty stones until my fingers bled and 
 my nails were worn to the quick. 
 
 Then the pangs of hunger and thirst assailed me, and I 
 tore at my flesh and drank my own warm blood in the 
 frenzy of my anguish. 
 
 Suddenly there came a pause in my delirium. I found 
 my hands grasping the yellow manuscripts that recorded the 
 awful fate that would forever follow the sole representative 
 of the Delameures. I spread the parchments open on the 
 floor of my dungeon and I grow supernaturally calm as I 
 write this history of my sad fate. 
 
 Even as I write, I can discern the form of Laline crouch- 
 ing down in the narrow passage outside. Oh, descendant of 
 mine, whose eye shall read these lines, beware of her ! She 
 will come to you, as she came to me, with the cncliantment 
 of her wondrous beauty, but oh, beware of her ! She will 
 cast about you the spell of her radiant eyes, she will charm 
 you with the celestial music of her voice, but oh beware,
 
 80 THE POMFHET MYSTERY. 
 
 beware of her ! She will raise you to Heaven with the 
 brightness of her smile; she will lead you into Hell as she 
 has led me ! Oh beware ! 
 
 Child, through whose veins my blood will run, as you 
 read these lines beware of the fatal beauty, the death deal- 
 ing loveliness of Laline ! 
 
 Beware 1 
 
 CHAPTER X.' 
 
 WHAT ETHEL SAW. 
 
 VANCE and his wife went to Boston for their wedding 
 trip, and when they came back they made their home with 
 the Squire in the old house next to the Bank. 
 
 Two long years passed by in which life was one long holi- 
 day for the young couple. Vance amused himself with his 
 painting or helped the Squire in the bank, and when Deacon 
 Grosvernor died became in his place a Director. Ethel at- 
 tended to such household duties as Aunt Martha left for 
 her or drove out with her husband, and every little while 
 they took long trips to Boston, New York and Philadelphia, 
 and sometimes to the far West and South. 
 
 Ethel grew to love her husband more and more. She 
 was one of those women who having loved gives up her 
 whole heart to the man of her choice. Her love for him 
 grew and increased more and more day by day, and as her 
 nature was a deep and strong one, so her love was deeper 
 and stronger than the love of many another woman, had its 
 roots deep in her heart and had entwined itself into her 
 very being. Woe imto her if ever that love was spurned or 
 betrayed. It could not die without shaking the very founda- 
 tions of her life; and mingled with her love was a reverence
 
 WHAT ETHEL SAW. 81 
 
 and admiration for her husband. He was so clever and dis- 
 tinguished. He seemed to be able to do everything and to 
 do it well. Her father was surprised at his knowledge of 
 book-keeping he answered that he had been a year in a 
 banker's office in London while his father lived there. He 
 was a natural mechanic, a fine, delicate workman, but he 
 explained that he had ever had a hobby for mechanics; and 
 beyond his physical and mental gifts, Ethel, with the fine 
 intuitions of a woman who loves, saw that there was in her 
 husband a striving after a new, a purer, a holier, better life 
 than he had led before. Sometimes, it is true, he exhibited 
 fits of restlessness. He was dull and abstracted for days at 
 a time. Even his wife's presence failed to cheer him. 
 
 " He is bored in this quiet place," said the Squire to her 
 one day when one of these moods was upon his son-in-law. 
 " Young men need action. Young men need change. Let 
 him to go to the city for a week or two alone. That will 
 cheer him up." 
 
 There is something finer in the nervous organization of a 
 woman than in that of a man. It approaches nearer to the 
 spiritual and is interwoven with it. Often a woman, throw- 
 ing her reason aside and trusting to her intuitions, will go 
 right, although she knows not why. And so Ethel's heart 
 misgave her while she followed her father's advice and per- 
 suaded her husband to leave her. Even after he had re- 
 turned, fresh and bright again, with his gay, fantastic humor 
 sparkling and flashing as it did in the early days of his 
 courtship, her secret intuitions told her that there was 
 something lost. "Was it the aspiration toward a new and 
 holier life ? 
 
 He gave more time and attention to the bank after his 
 return, and seemed anxious to relieve the Squire of all care 
 and trouble connected therewith. He courted especially 
 friendship with Ephraim Chester; but the cashier met aU
 
 82 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 his advances very coldly and warily; seeming to desire to 
 build a wall between himself and Vance. He appeared to 
 mistrust him, and a close observer might have seen some 
 trace of fear in the care which he took and the watch which 
 he set upon himself when Vance was present. 
 
 More than once Vance ransacked his memory to find out 
 where he had seen the cashier before, and one evening as he 
 sat before the open wood fire thinking about it, it suddenly 
 flashed across his mind. 
 
 " I have it," he exclaimed aloud. 
 
 " Have what, dear?" said his wife, who was sitting by his 
 side sewing. 
 
 "Did I speak, Love?" 
 
 "You said ' I have it I'" 
 
 " I was thinking, my dear, and did not know that I 
 thought aloud." 
 
 " Arthur," said the Squire, entering the room, " are you 
 going to New York soon ? " 
 
 "Why, father?" 
 
 " We are going to start a Savings Bank and want two 
 hundred thousand dollars' worth of bonds, and I thought it 
 would save the expressage if you went to New York, bought 
 the bonds and brought them back with you." 
 
 Vance hesitated. There was a struggle in his soul, but it 
 was over in a minute. " I will go to-morrow." 
 
 " Well, I'll give you a check on our correspondents. Now, 
 good night, I am going to bed," and kissing his daughter 
 the Squire left the room. 
 
 " Don't go to-morrow, Arthur," said Ethel, rising and 
 leaning over her husband, smoothing his thick curly hair 
 with her hand. 
 
 " Why not, dearest?" he asked, reaching up and pulling 
 the hand clown to his lips. 
 
 " I can't give any reason, Arthur, but I have a feeling 
 that something dreadful will happen if you do."
 
 WHAT ETHEL SAW. 83 
 
 She felt a slight shudder run through his frame, as if he 
 had felt a sudden draught of chill air, but he only laughed 
 gayly as he answered, " It's not like my little wife to be 
 nervous. You are tired after the day's work. Come, let 
 us follow papa's example and go to bed." 
 
 Vance went to New York, stayed there two or three days, 
 and then came back bringing the bonds with him, and they 
 were locked up in the vault of the bank. 
 
 " You see, little wife, that I am back safe and sound," he 
 said as Ethel met him at the station. 
 
 " Yes, Arthur," she answered, and tears of joy glistened in 
 her eyes, "but I have been so miserable while you were 
 away." 
 
 " Well ! well !" he said, " I won't go away again for a 
 longtime." 
 
 And yet shortly afterward Vance again announced his in- 
 tention to leave Pomfret. He had received a letter, he 
 said, relating to some land which his father had left him in 
 Chicago and he must go there to attend personally to the 
 business. 
 
 " I hate to have you go away," Ethel exclaimed. 
 
 " I do not go for my own pleasure," he answered kissing 
 her, " and I will not be away long." 
 
 " I met Dr. Gamble as I came in," said the Squire at the 
 tea table, one evening several days after Vance had gone. 
 " He's been up to see Chester." 
 
 " What's the matter with him?" asked Aunt Martha. 
 
 " Doctor says he's bilious, hasn't slept enough. Got a 
 buzzin' in his head and his blood's sluggish and the heart's 
 action is weak." 
 
 " Why, papa," said Ethel, " you must have had quite a 
 talk with the doctor." 
 
 " And what is the doctor goin' to give him?" queried 
 Aunt Martha.
 
 84 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 " Gamble said lie would bleed him a little and then give 
 him a dose of something so that he would sleep all through 
 the night" 
 
 " It's nothing serious then?" 
 
 " I hope not. We need him in the bank." 
 
 ' ' How we miss Arthur ! " 
 
 " By the way, Ethel, I saw an old flame of yours in the 
 street this afternoon." 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 " Benny Moore. I asked him in to tea, but he said he 
 hadn't been out to the farm yet and had to go there first." 
 
 The evening passed away and the inmates of the house 
 were wrapped in slumber. 
 
 In the night Ethel awoke from troubled dreams. She 
 put out her hand to waken her husband, but his place was 
 vacant and she remembered he had gone away. The clock 
 in the meeting house steeple tolled " one." She tossed rest- 
 lessly from side to side unable to sleep. Her mind was 
 filled with vague alarms. She heard the clock strike the 
 half hour, then she arose, opened the window and looked 
 out. The night was very still. No sound was heard except 
 the wind sobbing and sighing through the branches of the 
 trees. Dark clouds scudded across the sky shutting out 
 groups of stars and seeming almost to cast shadows through 
 the darkness. 
 
 " We shall have rain before morning," she said to herself 
 as she closed the window and went back to bed. 
 
 The clock struck " two." Awake for an hour ; why 
 could she not sleep, what was the matter ? She lighted a 
 candle and went out in the hall. All was quiet. No there 
 was a noise in the lower hall. What was it? She went to 
 the head of the stairs to listen. The noise seemed like the 
 sound of subdued voices. She shaded the candle with her 
 hand and looked over the balustrades. All was dark.
 
 " QUICK AS A FLASH THE THOUGHT RUSHED ACROSS HER KIND OF PEOPLE 
 ATTEMPTING TO ROB THE BAKE." Page SO.
 
 86 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 "Who's there," she said softly. There was no answer. 
 Timidly she went down stairs, the light flickering and cast- 
 ing strange shadows on the wall. 
 
 She was half way down the staircase opposite to the door 
 leading into the bank when through the glass transom of 
 the doorway she saw a light. Quick as a flash the thought 
 rushed across her mind of people attempting to rob the 
 bank. 
 
 There were figures in the bank. She could see them 
 moving about. The doors of the vault were open. She 
 was about to scream but a deadly horror came over her. 
 That figure stooping down over a bag ! Surely she knew 
 it ? It rose and straightened itself and its outline became 
 full and distinct. She knew it ah how well. 
 
 A terrible faintness came over her. Her heart seemed 
 to stop its beating. Her limbs trembled. She turned 
 mechanically to go up stairs. The candle swayed from side 
 to side. Her feet seemed heavy as lead. She stumbled 
 on the steps. She tripped over her long wrapper, and 
 staggered to her room; the candle dropped upon the floor 
 extinguishing itself. She fell upon her bed. 
 
 All through the long hours until the dawn she lay there. 
 Those hours were years in their tedious length. The dark- 
 ness that settled over and folded itself about her soul was 
 blacker than the darkness of the night. The sight she had 
 seen seemed to be ever before her eyes, to be burnt into 
 her heart and brain for they felt on fire. 
 
 Her thoughts grew more and more disordered. Her 
 memory turned to scenes of other days. She thought of 
 her husband. She called on him. Why did he not 
 answer ? Then the sight she had seen made itself felt once 
 more. She felt a longing for death. It was less terrible 
 than the great horror that oppressed her. Her husband 
 ha ! his razors were at hand; it needed but one firm cut
 
 A MYSTERIOUS MURDER. 87 
 
 and in a few seconds all would be over. She strove to rise 
 from the bed, a strange invisible power held her down. 
 She strove to cry out, but her throat was parched and dry 
 and no sound would come from it. 
 
 When daylight broke and the stir of life commenced again 
 in the house, Aunt Martha, going to her early duties, saw the 
 door of the bedroom wide open and Ethel lying apparently 
 lifeless on the bed. 
 
 Then there was a hurrying to and fro in the gray twilight 
 of the early morning. Old Dr. Gamble was summoned to 
 the bedside. The old Squire, with the white stubble of his 
 beard shining on his unshaved, anxious face, was moving 
 restlessly about the house. 
 
 "It is no ordinary faintness," said the old doctor as he 
 lanced the white arm and saw the red blood, slowly, very 
 slowly, trickle from the wound which his lancet had made. 
 
 " Arthur," she moaned at last as she came to. 
 
 The sun rose higher in the heavens, the world awoke to 
 the cares and duties of a new day and the old doctor sat by 
 her bedside holding her wrist in his hand and looking very 
 grave. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 A MYSTERIOUS MURDEE. 
 
 GREAT was the excitement in Pomfret when the news 
 was spread abroad that the bank had been robbed. All 
 the depositors had a personal interest in the matter and 
 were eager for details. But not all heard the news with 
 the same sensations. Some bewailed the loss of their money 
 hard-earned savings, perhaps others, mostly the trades- 
 people, felt that there was compensation in the fact that 
 their notes had been carried off and that there would be no
 
 88 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 call upon them for payment when the day of maturity ar- 
 rived. 
 
 The excitement was deepened and intensified later on by 
 the news that a dead body had been found stranded on a 
 shoal in the river. The news flew about in vague rumors 
 at first, but soon gathered more substance as detail after 
 detail was added to it. It was asserted to be a woman's 
 body; then that the corpse had been identified as Adele 
 Hollenbeck, who had worked a long while ago for Squire 
 Leslie, then that the body had been dead for at least two or 
 three days. Later on it was rumored that signs of a fierce 
 struggle had been discovered in the park, and that bushes 
 had been broken and that a track was plain where some 
 heavy body had been dragged to the waterside. 
 
 Here were items for the gossips, and many were the sage 
 opinions and shrewd guesses as to the why, and when and 
 how of their occurrence. They dwarfed the bank robbery 
 into insignificance, however, and the sickness of Ethel Vance 
 and the murder almost took the precedence. 
 
 How came Adele Hollenbeck in Pomfret ? Had any one 
 seen her alive ? She had left the Squire's house more than 
 two years ago, promising to return in a week, but from that 
 day until her body was found stranded on the sandy island 
 in the river none of the Pomfret folks had seen her. What 
 was the object of her murder robbery, revenge or what? 
 Had it any connection with the robbery of the bank ? Such 
 were some of the questions which agitated the people of 
 Pomfret all through the long hours of the day and late into 
 the night and drew crowds of people from the country 
 round about. 
 
 Those who had found the body, and, wading out into the 
 river, had brought it ashore, and later on had borne it wet 
 and slimy down to the undertaker's store, were heroes of 
 the hour, and all day long were surrounded by an eager
 
 A MYSTERIOUS MURDER. 8 
 
 . 
 
 crowd which never tired of listening to a rehearsal of the 
 finding. 
 
 It was not a case of suicide. The bruises on the body, 
 the trampled ground and the path to the waterside all spoke 
 of murder. But who had done the deed ? What was the 
 motive? "Where was the murderer? 
 
 The body was buried, and in later years Ethel caused a 
 simple slab of marble to be raised above the grave and that 
 slab bore only the words " Adele Hollenbeck." 
 
 From that day to this Pomfret Park has been haunted. 
 On moonlight nights passers-by have seen a white figure 
 sitting by the waterside or flitting noiseless through the 
 underbrush. On stormy nights sounds of moaning, 
 shrieks, mutterings and sobs come from the wildly tempest 
 tossed woods, and ever and anon comes a dull plash rising 
 above all other sounds, as if some heavy body is being cast 
 into the water. At autumn, when the leaves turn, the 
 trees and bushes, through which once ran the trampled 
 path which the murderer with his strange ghastly burden 
 took to the riverside, flame with crimson dyes, as if the 
 blood of the murdered woman rose from the earth to cry 
 out against the murderer. 
 
 Two such great crimes happening so close together could 
 not but be imputed to the same criminals, and therefore it 
 was not strange that there were many in Pomfret who 
 openly declared that the robbers were the murderers also. 
 
 But the mystery which hung over the two great crimes 
 was yet unsolved. 
 
 During the years that had followed Ethel's marriage to 
 Arthur Vance, Benny Moore had remained in New York 
 practicing his profession. It was uphill work for him, a 
 stranger, hardly knowing any one in the great city, to make 
 his way, but he persevered bravely, counting no work as 
 unworthy of his labor, rejecting nothing that came to him.
 
 90 THE POMFUKT MYSTERY. 
 
 *His practice at first was almost exclusively among the poor 
 small criminal cases with trifling fees and smaller honor 
 to be gained from them. The allowance which his father 
 made him and his literary earnings were barely sufficient to 
 provide for his necessities, but nevertheless it kept him from 
 hunger and want and ho was spared the many harsher 
 strokes of misfortune which have beaten so many an aspir- 
 ing soul into its grave. 
 
 Yet still he perserved, and as he became better known in 
 the police courts his clients increased. It was not pleasant 
 work to him the association with common malefactors was 
 neither elevating nor agreeable, and it was rarely that he 
 was called upon in a case of sufficient magnitude to be in- 
 teresting, or that involved points of law at all subtle and 
 deep. 
 
 The pleasant times were when he mingled with the de- 
 tectives and heard their tales of marvelous adventures and 
 narrow escapes, or more rarely followed them step by step 
 as they traced some crime to its perpetrator, or slowly un- 
 raveled some tangled skein of evidence. They sometimes 
 came to consult him about their cases, for he had a clear 
 mind and good judgment and his advice was often valuable 
 to them. 
 
 In time lie met John Loring and formed a partnership 
 with him, and then began slowly to number a better class 
 of men among his clients. 
 
 Did he ever think of Ethel Leslie ? Often he thought of 
 her ; but as the years rolled by his thoughts grew less dread- 
 ful and less hopeless. Time, the great healer, was slowly 
 but surely doing his work; the wounds were healing, al- 
 though ugly scars might remain. 
 
 Since Ethel's marriage he had not gone to Pomfret, but 
 letters from home told him from time to time how matters 
 stood and what was going on. At first when such letters
 
 . BENNY'S DREAM. 91 
 
 came he found himself eagerly watching for and yet dread- 
 ing lest he should find some mention of Ethel, but as the 
 days passed such hopes and fears faded and the news of the 
 farm how the cattle and horses and crops were doing was 
 what he was interested in. 
 
 As his mind recovered from its shock there grew upon 
 him a longing to see his home once more, and as he had not 
 taken a holiday since he had come to New York be deter- 
 mined to revisit, for a few days, the scenes of his youth. 
 
 So it happened that he alighted from the train at Pomfret 
 the day before the robbery the. day before Adele Holl en- 
 beck's dead body had been found in the river the day 
 before Ethel's sudden illness. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 BENNY'S DREAM. 
 
 MRS. MOORE was overjoyed to see her <c boy" back again, 
 and with true housewifely pride she set the supper table 
 with every domestic dainty likely to tempt his appetite. 
 And Benny was hungry and did full justice to all the good 
 things on the table, eating of them until he could eat no 
 more. 
 
 The meal was not a silent one. Benny had much to tell 
 about his life in the city and many questions to ask about 
 the doings on the farm, and the Moores lingered longer 
 than was their custom over the table. 
 
 The evening passed quietly, for like all animals who have 
 fed heartily, the two men were principally desirous of rest 
 and inactivity, and at ten o'clock they all retired to rest. 
 
 Benjamin Moore was about five feet six inches in height, 
 compactly yet gracefully built, with a face showing already
 
 92 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 lines of deep thought and study. His chest was broad and 
 deep, his head and neck were set well on his shouders, his 
 forehead was broad rather than high, his eyes, softly brown 
 in color, were clear and steady and shaded by heavy eyebrows, 
 his nose was long and straight and full. A thick curly 
 beard, dark brown in color, like the rest of his hair, hid 
 the lower part of his face, but his mouth and chin were 
 strong and resolute. He was evidently a man of will and 
 determination, of no mean intellectual power; reticent 
 rather than demonstrative, strong in his loves and his hates. 
 
 His room was over the front hall, with a dormer window 
 looking down the path to the road. As he retired to rest 
 that night he glanced out at the familiar scene and gave 
 half a sigh for former days, wishing that they might 
 come again. Then he blew out the lamp, jumped into the 
 feather bed, drew the bed-clothes and quilted coverlet over 
 him and was soon fast asleep. 
 
 How long he slept he did not know, but he was awakened 
 by what seemed to him to be the sound of a shrill voice and 
 by a weight upon his chest. He opened his eyes and saw, 
 sitting upon the folds of the quilt, the figure of a tiny old 
 man whose face looked strangely familiar, as if it had been 
 an old acquaintance unaccountably forgotten; yet Benny's 
 memory did not place it. Strangely, too, he did not feel the 
 least frightened, but experienced only a profound sense of 
 disgust that the old fellow should have perched himself 
 where he was and thus given him that constrained feeling 
 of his breast. 
 
 " Would you mind, sir," Benny said politely, "removing 
 your seat to another part of the bed where your weight will 
 not interfere with my breathing ? " 
 
 " Certainly ! But I did not think that I weighed any- 
 thing/' the apparition answered as he glided to one side. 
 
 Glided is the proper word to use, for the motion could
 
 BENNY'S DREAM. 93 
 
 not be said to be a walk, run or flight; it seemed rather as 
 if the old fellow was suddenly removed without changing 
 his posture. Benny might have thought it all a trick of 
 imagination had it not been for the cessation of the pressure 
 which had annoyed him and for the queer figure that still 
 met his gaze. 
 
 "Thank you," Benny remarked when the change had 
 been effected, " and now will you kindly tell me who you 
 are?" 
 
 "You don't recognize me?" said the spectre. "I am 
 your first ancestor who came over to this country." 
 
 " On my father's or my mother's side ? " Benny queried. 
 
 " Your mother's mother was my daughter's child." 
 
 " Say it again and say it slow, won't you?" said Benny, 
 "for I am not good at genealogies and am quite mixed up 
 by your descriptions." 
 
 " Your mother's mother ," said he. 
 
 " My mother's mother. Yes, I have got that." 
 
 " Was my daughter's child." 
 
 " Was your daughter's child. Then my mother's mother 
 was my grandmother and your daughter was my great- 
 grandmother and you must be my great-great-grandfather/ 
 
 " Yes, that's it," he answered, nodding his head violently. 
 
 " And to what am I indebted for the honor of your visit ? " 
 asked Benny 
 
 " Oh nothing in particular," the ghost replied; " I some- 
 times like to come back to my old haunts and see how things 
 are getting on." 
 
 Benny looked more closely at the strange figure. He 
 wore a peaked, gray beard reaching to his waist, and his 
 gray hair, so far as could be seen under the conical hat that 
 he wore, was cropped close to his head. He was clothed in 
 a suit of rusty black, home-made evidently, and Benny 
 thought as he looked at him that it might be home-spun
 
 94 THE PQMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 also. The goblin said nothing while he was undergoing 
 this scrutiny and Benny broke the silence by speaking first. 
 
 " The garb that you wear," he said, " I suppose is the 
 Puritan costume of your time ? " 
 
 "Certainly," the spectre replied, grinning. "What 
 else should I wear ? " 
 
 Benny did not know and so remained silent. 
 
 " You must excuse my wearing my hat," the queer figure 
 continued, designating, by a wave of his hand, his head 
 gear. "You must excuse my wearing my hat, but there 
 are so many draughts about and I am very liable to catch 
 cold." 
 
 " But haven't you anything to say to me ? " Benny queried, 
 " I begin to think it was really a shame that I should be 
 waked for nothing. Tell me something about yourself. 
 Aren't there any more of you ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, plenty. There they are." 
 
 Benny's eyes followed the direction of the ghost's gesture, 
 and saw, dimly in the shadow, a whole row of figures, 
 some large and some small. If he had not noticed them 
 before it must have been because they stood where the 
 room was dark, while the little old fellow himself sat 
 directly in a ray of moonlight that fell upon the bed. 
 
 " Are they all ancestors?" Benny asked. 
 
 " Certainly they are," the ghost responded, " if they 
 were not they would not be here. The little ones are the 
 oldest and the big ones the youngest. You will observe 
 that I am the smallest of all." 
 
 " That's very odd," said Benny. 
 
 " You think so? " the ghost answered. " You see while 
 we were alive on earth we were all the time growing bigger 
 and bigger, but now, before we can become perfectly spiritu- 
 alized, we must grow smaller until we become nothing when 
 we reach that state Ave are perfect spirits, now we are only 
 ghosts."
 
 BENNY'S DREAM. 95 
 
 " In that case," said Benn}^ " children must have the 
 advantage of you." 
 
 " Of course they do," the spectre responded. " While I 
 lived on earth I used to think that it was a thing to be proud 
 of that I had lived to be ninety years of age; since then, 
 I have come to the conclusion that it is a pity that I did not 
 die when I was five years old." 
 
 " But while you are in your present condition, you go 
 around and see things, don't you ? " 
 
 " Of course," the ghost answered with a grimace of dis- 
 content. " That's part of the bother of it. One gets so 
 tired of traveling, you know; and I confess that it always 
 annoys me to get among Quakers and Anabaptists, as one 
 sometimes will by accident." 
 
 " And then, too, you generally have to frequent such 
 disagreeable places old ruins, and musty cellars and such 
 like abodes." 
 
 " Pshaw ! " the specter cried fiercely. " Who told you 
 that ! Much he knew about it ! Why it's only a few, melan- 
 choly, weak-minded ghosts who like those sort of things, 
 and they're apt to get awfully lonely there, and that's why 
 they so often become visible because they're lonely and 
 want company." 
 
 While the little old figure of the great-great-grandfather 
 was talking Benny became aware that something was agi- 
 tating those other figures in the room, and when he ceased 
 a querulous voice was distinctly heard complaining; 
 
 " Of course when he's around no one can get a word in 
 edgeways." 
 
 The old fellow heard it too, and turned quickly toward 
 them and exclaimed angrily. 
 
 " That ain't so, and you know it ain't so, and you knew it 
 wasn't so when you said it. Oh, I know your voice, Molly 
 Mason ! I leave it to those present if I'm half as great a 
 talker as you are."
 
 96 THE P03ORET MYSTERY. 
 
 A shrill voice made some sort of a reply, but what it was 
 Benny could not distinguish among the murmurs that went 
 up and the smothered laughter from the crowd of ancestors, 
 as if a dispute between these two was of such frequent oc- 
 currence as to be a joke. 
 
 Benny hastened to compose the threatened quarrel. 
 
 " Sir," said he, "I can assure you that I have listened 
 with the greatest possible interest to your conversation and 
 nothing could give me more pleasure than to hear what you 
 and my other ancestors present have to say. " 
 
 " You might tell him the story of ' The Golden Goose/ " 
 suggested a voice. 
 
 The little old man shook his head. " Not to-night," he 
 said. " Let us do something of general interest. Now 
 there is the buried treasure." 
 
 "The Buried Treasure ?" said Benny. "Is that a story 
 too." 
 
 " No, it's a real treasure buried in the orchard. Come, 
 we will show it to you." 
 
 A treasure buried in the orchard ! there had been rumors 
 there were family traditions of such a thing, and now 
 it was to be discovered ! Benny felt like laughing for joy 
 at the thought. He started to jump out of bed, but a faint 
 scream reminded him of him ancestresses present. 
 
 " Oh pardon me, ladies," he exclaimed, " I had forgotten 
 your presence." 
 
 There was considerable snickering and giggling as the 
 .shadowy ghosts passed out by the doorway, and as the last 
 one departed Benny leaped from his bed and hastily donned 
 .his clothes. Then, preceded by the troop of ancestors, he 
 passed downstairs and out through the front door. 
 
 It was a beautiful night. A slight snow covered the 
 ground and upon its silvery surface the moonlight traced 
 the outline of the twigs and branches of the trees as all
 
 DEE AM. 97 
 
 passed under them in the orchard. The night was very 
 still. The sound of the crisp snow, crunched under foot, 
 seemed to be loud enough to waken the sleepers in the 
 house. Benny noticed, however, that only his footsteps 
 were audible. Ancestors, one and all, passed noiselessly on, 
 leaving no footprints. 
 
 They reached the middle of the orchard, where as a land- 
 mark, stood an ancient apple-tree, which, tradition said, 
 had been planted by the ancestor who built the house. 
 Benny was about to ask if tradition was correct in this 
 respect, when his attention was- again attracted to the ances- 
 tral specters and he noticed that each one had a spade. 
 Forming a ring they began to dig, and though their spades 
 were shadowy and indistinct the earth seemed to yield 
 before them and the hole grew bigger and bigger 
 
 At last Benny saw uncovered by the workers, a wooden 
 box, ornamented with quaint iron scroll-work, seemingly 
 big enough to hold three bushels, in general appearance a 
 proper strong box to contain a buried treasure. As he 
 looked intently at it he could see no sign of padlock nor 
 hinge, but the whole was corded about with strong hempen 
 cords. Benny could not but marvel at the strangeness of 
 securing so strong a box with such frail fastenings. 
 
 But he had not long to thus indulge in reveries. The 
 quaint old figure that had aroused him from sleep stepped 
 forward and bade him, " Cut the cords. 
 
 Benny stood abashed, for a pocket-knife was something 
 that he never carried. 
 
 " Sir/* said he, blushing at the confession he was about 
 to make, " Sir, I have no knife. " 
 
 " WHAT?" the ghost exclaimed. 
 
 " Sir," Benny repeated, " I have no knife. I have never 
 carried one." 
 
 Then from all the ancestors arose a chorus of cries and
 
 98 THE POMFBET MYSTERY. 
 
 groans among which Benny distinguished only such revilings 
 as these: 
 
 " Out upon him! Born in Yankee-land and has no jack- 
 knife ! Comes of pure Yankee blood and carries no knife ! 
 He is a changeling ! He is no true descendant of ours ! 
 Quick, hide the treasure from his sight ! Quick, hide the 
 treasure ! " 
 
 Almost instantly they began to throw back the earth into 
 the hole. The space about the sides of the box was filled in; 
 the clods of earth fell with a dull thud upon the cover, hid- 
 ing it from sight. What was to be done ? 
 
 Benny was not thus to be deprived of the treasure, but 
 he had no time to hesitate. He shut his eyes and gave a 
 desperate spring and landed on the cover of the box. The 
 earth seemed to fly upon him from all sides. He felt it 
 rising up until it covered his thighs and his arms and reached 
 up to his neck. He felt it press closely around so that his 
 heart could scarcely beat under its weight. His feet grew 
 colder as the blood refused to circulate through them, and 
 the cold kept creeping higher until it reached his knees. 
 
 Determined to make one desperate effort, he opened his 
 eyes. It was morning. The sun was shining brightly into 
 the room. Benny lay upon his bed, but the sheet, the 
 blanket and the coverlet were wound tightly around his 
 throat and chest and his feet were bare. 
 
 He breathed a long sigh of relief and jumped from his 
 bed, and as he dressed he laughed at the memory of " The 
 Ghosts of his Ancestors." 
 
 But that day he brought a pocket-knife and he has carried 
 one ever since.
 
 NEWS OF THE EOBBEKY. 99 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 NEWS OF THE KOBBEEY. 
 
 POMFEET, April 3rd, 18 
 
 To OLIVEE LOEING, ESQ. ; 
 
 care of Loring & Moore, 19 Nassau St., N.Y. 
 DEAE LOEING: You know when I left you that I 
 thought I should be back in a day or two, but I have 
 changed my plans, and of course want to tell you why. 
 
 But before I begin to do so, I wish to write a word 
 about the telegram I sent you this morning. It was 
 "Pomfret Bank robbed. Please see Sneeden, Chief of 
 Police, and ask him to send the best detective on the force 
 to Pomfret. Let him inquire for me as a friend. Telegraph 
 at length in our firm cipher. We are retained in the case. " 
 
 Now to return to the reasons why I shall be detained 
 here, and to begin at the very beginning. 
 
 I reached here safe and sound, though the train was 
 late, and after a short time spent in the town I drove out 
 home. I was up early this morning, as I generally am in 
 the country, and went out with father to see the cows milked 
 and start the day's work on the farm. 
 
 There was not much for me to do about the barns, so 
 after saying " how d'ye do " to the help and petting the horses 
 and cattle and giving Duke some sugar he remembered me 
 perfectly in spite of my long absence and neighed with 
 pleasure when he heard my voice I took the lawn mower 
 and began to run it over the lawn between the house and 
 the road. 
 
 Pushing and pulling a lawn mower is pretty good work,
 
 100 THE POMFBET MYSTERY. 
 
 as perhaps you know, and I was congratulating myself upon 
 the splendid appetite I was acquiring for breakfast when I 
 heard the sound of a wagon coming along the road, and look- 
 ing up recognized Ezra Cummins' sorrel horse; I think I 
 told you how I raced Duke against him once and beat him. 
 
 " Well, I knew that Erza did not drive that horse into a 
 lather, as he was then, except on special occasions, and I 
 wondered what was up. He saw me and drove into the 
 avenue and asked me if I had heard the news. Of course I 
 had not. Then he told me that the Pomfret Bank had 
 been robbed. Ezra is one of the constables of the town and 
 I therefore believed what he said. He and others had been 
 sent out to collect the directors at the bank as soon as possi- 
 ble. In answer to my enquiries he said that Mrs. Vance, 
 Squire Leslie's daughter was very ill, that her husband had 
 gone away two or three days previously and that the town 
 was terribly excited. The robbery had been discovered only 
 half an hour before he left, so that he had no theory worth 
 mentioning as to who had committed the crime, but he had 
 been in the bank and described the safe as having been 
 thoroughly gutted of its contents. 
 
 I had only a few minutes' conversation with him as he was 
 in a great hurry. I doubt if he would have stopped at all if 
 he had not thought it just as well to breath his horse and 
 wished to boast to me of his coming from the town in eigh- 
 teen minutes. 
 
 My father, you know, owns a few shares in the bank, 
 and keeps his money there, but fortunately he had just 
 been paying for some land and his account is therefore small. 
 If the bank had been robbed two weeks ago he would have 
 lost several thousand dollars. Knowing, however, his interest 
 in the bank I did not tell him what I had heard until after he 
 had finished his breakfast, for I knew he would go to Pom- 
 fret as soon as he heard of it, and I thought he might as well
 
 OF THE ROBBERY. 101 
 
 go after a good breakfast as before; but previously to going 
 in to breakfast I gave Andy the stable boy, you remember 
 instructions to put Duke into a light buggy, so that there 
 would be no delay when we were ready to start. We lost 
 no time on the road I can assure you. 
 
 It was wonderful with what rapidity the news had 
 spread. 
 
 There was a crowd around the bank when we got to town, 
 and I could not at first find a place to hitch Duke, every 
 shed and hitching post seemed to be occupied. At last it 
 occurred to me that as Ezra was away there would be a stall 
 vacant in his barn, so I drove up there and got permission 
 of his wife to hitch in the stable, because I felt pretty 
 sure that we would stay in town the greater part of the day. 
 
 After I had unharnessed and blanketed Duke, I went 
 back to the bank. There was very little to be learned from 
 the crowd. All sorts of rumors were about, but they were 
 too absurd to be remembered. Both the bank and the 
 Squire's house had a constable in guard over them, and every 
 one except the directors was refused admission. I was not to 
 be bluffed in that way, however; and as I wan ted to see Aunt 
 Martha and find out how Mrs. Vance was I worked my way 
 out of the crowd, went down the side street and into a 
 pasture back of the Squire's house and so up into the garden 
 and to the back porch. Fortunately Aunt Martha saw me 
 and invited me in or else I should probably have been or- 
 dered away, for there was a man at the back of the house to 
 keep people out of the garden. 
 
 While I was in the kitchen talking to Aunt Martha, 
 Mr. Morrison, one of the local lawyers and counsel for the 
 bank, came in to get a drink of water, and seeing me there 
 shook hands with me and asked me to assist him, I con- 
 sented very gladly, of course, and now you have the reason 
 of my staying here.
 
 102 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 I found most of the directors assembled in the bank- 
 parlor with Squire Leslie, and they seemed glad to see me. 
 A more confounded and dazed set of men you never saw in 
 your life; but I flatter myself that during the two years 
 that you and I have been in partnership we have tried too 
 many criminal cases for either of us to be fluttered by the 
 occurrence of a crime in which we have no personal interest. 
 
 While I was in the room Sheriff Delaney came in. He 
 had been sent for as soon as the robbery had been discovered, 
 but as he had been spending the night at Pocassett, ten 
 miles off, he had just arrived. 
 
 As you do not know the Sheriff I think it worth while 
 to describe him to you. In the first place he is an old 
 soldier and acquired in the army a military style which he 
 has ever since been carrying about with him and nursing 
 into what I might almost call a caricature. In the next 
 place he is tall and portly, with a strong commanding voice 
 and very resolute eye. He wore a dark-blue frock coat with 
 brass buttons and heavily f rogged, and dark blue trousers 
 with a black braid down the seams. In short, if you looked 
 at him you would know that he was a policeman, from the 
 sole of his foot to the crown of the soft felt army hat that 
 he wore upon his head. He even carried a club in his hand, 
 as if he expected to find the robbers waiting for him in the 
 bank. 
 
 He gave a military salute to the directors, and having 
 heard what they had to say, began his investigation by going 
 around the premises inside and out. 
 
 The examination showed that the thieves had not broken 
 into the bank from the outside, but had used false keys to 
 gain an easy entrance. The locks of the doors of the 
 vault would not turn but no signs of force were apparent 
 on the steel and iron. It Avas not possible that an explosive 
 could be used without many people hearing the noise, and
 
 NEWS OF THE KOBBEKY. 103 
 
 the night had been undisturbed. So many people having 
 crowded around the bank, up to its very walls, it was im- 
 possible to find any footsteps or marks in the ground out- 
 side which would afford a clue to the method by which the 
 burglars removed their booty. 
 
 After a deal of useless questioning the Sheriff decided 
 upon visiting the railroad station. I went over with him, 
 for I began to think that he was making an ass of himself. 
 While he was talking to the station master I slipped around 
 to the telegraph office and sent the message I told you of. 
 I did not have my cipher with me, but the operator was an 
 old school-mate and friend of mine and promised to keep 
 the telegram secret. The reason why I wish the detective 
 to represent himself as a friend is because these country 
 officials are touchy, and tenacious of their dignity. 
 
 Fortunately the station master, who is a sensible man, 
 had been himself about the station during the morning 
 hours and was positive that only one passenger had taken 
 the train from the station between the hours of twelve and 
 five. That passenger had come from Pawtucket. Having 
 missed the evening Boston train from that place he had 
 ridden down to Pomfret on a freight engine, waited at the 
 station an hour and then taken the sleeper which passes at 
 four o'clock for Boston. It was quite impossible that he 
 could be the thief, because the station master was positive 
 that he had come down on the freight train. 
 
 Having learnt all that he could from the station master 
 the Sheriff returned to the bank, where the directors still 
 were, their number augmented by one or two who had come 
 in since we left. The cashier, Ephraim Chester, had also 
 arrived during our absence, and explained his delay in com- 
 ing by stating that Dr. Gamble had given him a dose of 
 valerian the night before, in consequence whereof he had 
 not awakened until a short time ago.
 
 104 THE POMFRET MY8TERT. 
 
 Sheriff Delaney sat himself down at the table, and tak- 
 ing a sheet of paper began an examination of the directors, 
 making notes as he went on. In a little while it became 
 clear to me that in default of any other likely theory he 
 suspected the directors of being in some way concerned in 
 the robbery or accessory to it. I saw in this earlier than the 
 others, but it soon became so plain that every one else saw it 
 too, and I could see that their answers were becoming more 
 and more indignant. Finally Mr. Morrison, who is a gruff 
 sort of fellow, spoke up and demanded to know which of the 
 directors the Sheriff thought was the thief. Delaney was 
 staggered at this, for he had much reverence for the powers 
 that be, and he made a hasty disclaimer of any such sus- 
 picion and a rather lame apology for some of his questions. 
 To relieve him of his embarrassment I whispered to him a 
 suggestion that it might be well to start clever men out in 
 various directions to see if they could find any trace of the 
 thieves. He took my suggestion in good part and after a 
 few aimless questions put it out as his own. Most of the 
 directors immediately expressed their willingness to take 
 certain roads and we easily enlisted others from the crowd 
 outside, so that some thirty, all told, were to scour the 
 country and report at the bank at noon to-morrow. I send 
 you a list of their names and the routes each took. 
 
 I am writing you this at home. It is past eleven 
 at night and I am tired out, so I shall go to bed and write 
 you more in the morning. One of the men will take this 
 now down to Pomfret and see that it gets into the mail car 
 on the New York Express which passes at 2:30, so you 
 ought to get it at noon to-morrow. 
 
 I forgot to mention that your telegram was received. 
 Some one will be at the depot to meet Mr. Price, the detec- 
 tive, and he will come right here. There has been a murder 
 here, but I know none of the details as yet and am not much
 
 ANOTHER LETTER. 105 
 
 interested about it unless it is in some way connected with 
 the robbery. Good night. 
 
 Sincereiy your partner, 
 
 BENJAMIN T. MOORE. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ANOTHER LETTER. 
 
 WOODSIDE, April 4, 18 
 
 To OLIVER LORING, ESQ., etc.: 
 
 DEAR LORING: After writing you last night I 
 went to bed and slept the sleep of the fatigued and of the 
 just, and now I am up bright and early, have had a glass 
 of milk fresh from tb^ cow, taken a turn through the barns 
 and sit down to write you until breakfast, or until Price 
 comes. 
 
 After we had fixed the routes and chosen the emissaries 
 of justice as mentioned to you in my last letter the directors 
 formally passed a resolution offering a reward of twenty 
 thousand dollars for the capture of the thieves or the return 
 of the stolen property, and a reward of fifty dollars for in- 
 formation of the route taken by them in their flight. 
 Handbills were struck off, and we soon had a sufficient 
 number for the messengers to distribute. We relied on the 
 Associate Press to spread wider the news of the robbery and 
 of the reward. 
 
 By one o'clock all the messengers had had their dinners, 
 fed their horses and started off and then at the Squire's in- 
 vitation those of the directors who remained and myself 
 went into the Squire's to dinner. Doctor Gamble was there. 
 I am sorry to say that Mrs. Vance has a severe attack of 
 brain fever and the Doctor thinks it a very grave case.
 
 106 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 The absence of Arthur Vance at this time perplexes me. 
 It is the opinion of the Squire and of every one that I have 
 heard mention the subject, that he will return as soon as he 
 sees the notice of the robbery in the newspapers. I never 
 liked him, but he has certainly made friends, and warm 
 friends, of everybody here. 
 
 I have arranged that nothing in the bank shall be dis- 
 turbed until to-morrow afternoon. By that time we shall 
 have had the report of our travelers, and Price will be here 
 and have had a look at everything. I am glad Sneeden has 
 detailed him, for I have every possible confidence in his 
 ability. Strange as it may seem, no one has yet thought of 
 calling upon the city detectives. You may be sure I did 
 not suggest it, although the more I see of Sheriff Delaney 
 the more unbearably pompous he becomes. 
 
 Ephraim Chester, the cashier, went to Boston to ar- 
 range for a loan for temporary purposes. A new bank will 
 open to-morrow in Mr. Mountain's office for the convenience 
 of mill-owners, although I do not believe that any of the 
 tradespeople will put their money out of their sight for a 
 long time to come; they are too much shocked at finding 
 that the bank was not unimpregnable. 
 
 I wish I could tell you what a great state of excitement 
 the town was in yesterday. The mills had shut down, not 
 having cash enough for present needs and because every one 
 was too excited to work. The vast body of operatives in 
 the streets were reinforced by men, women and children 
 from the country round about. The railroad company and 
 the Post Office authorities had promptly transmitted to their 
 agents money enough for present needs, but a great many of 
 the shopkeepers were left almost penniless. Sheriff Delaney 
 has been emphatically the biggest toad in the puddle and 
 has lost his head with a excessive self-consciousness of his 
 own importance. I wish you were here to help me, but of
 
 ANOTHER LETTEE. 
 
 107 
 
 course we cannot both be away from the office at the same 
 time. I have to thank you for one thing, however. If it 
 had not been that I wished to write you this letter I should 
 not have been up early enough to see the sunrise. It was 
 really a sight worth seeing, for I have not seen one for two 
 years. The trees are really budding and the grass is already 
 green. Kobins were seen on the lawn this morning for the 
 first time. 
 
 POMFRET, 9 A.M. 
 
 I continue this letter at Mr. Morrison's office. Price 
 has come. He arrived at seven and had a good appetite for 
 breakfast, and mother was delighted at the way that he dis- 
 posed of her coffee, fricasseed chicken and bannocks. 
 
 He seems to be really glad to get into the country, and 
 would not let me say a word about business until I had 
 shown him through the barns and partly over the farm. It 
 was not until I was driving him to town that I could tell 
 him what I knew about the case, and it was then that we 
 arranged that he should represent himself to be a friend 
 and client who had come to consult me about a case in New 
 York and whom I had persuaded to remain over. 
 
 On our arrival at the town, having put Duke up at the 
 hotel, we went first to Sheriff Delaney's house, but he was not 
 in, so leaving word that we would be back in half an hour we 
 took a walk through the town. Then we went back to 
 Delaney's house. 
 
 I wish you could have seen the meeting between the 
 two men. I have already described the Sheriff to you as a 
 pompous fellow, tall and burly, and Price, you know, is just 
 the reverse; small, slight, partly bald, with a thin low voice 
 and quiet manner. He was dressed very plainly too without 
 a particle of the " shop " about him. His face looked more 
 weazened than ever by the side of the Sheriff's ruddy coun-
 
 108 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 tenance; his fingers seemed more long, crooked and claw- 
 like when clasped in the big, fat, pudgy hand of the Sheriff. 
 
 " Captain Delaney," said I, in introducing the two men, 
 " this is Mr. Price, of New York, who has come up here to 
 see me on business and to stay over with me a day or two. 
 I wished him to know you." 
 
 Delaney gave his military salute. I noticed a slight 
 twitching about the corners of Price's mouth, but that was 
 the only sign I detected of his being amused. 
 
 " Mr. Price," said the Sheriff, " I am glad to make your 
 acquaintance." 
 
 " And I am glad to make your acquaintance," said Price 
 pleasantly. " Mr. Moore has often told me about you. 
 Now there was the case of Bob Simpson, who robbed the 
 widow Langdon and hid in the woods. That was a master- 
 piece of detective work." 
 
 Where on earth Price had picked up this piece of in- 
 formation I am sure I do not know. I a confident, how- 
 ever, that I never told him about it, but of course I held 
 my tongue. 
 
 Wherever the information came from the case was an 
 actual one of the Sheriff's, and Price's mention of it had a 
 wonderful effect upon him. He beamed with delight and 
 fairly bubbled over with joy and insisted on "telling the his- 
 tory of the case. From that he got off upon his life since, 
 and finally, after half an hour's wandering, got around to the 
 robbery of the bank. Price increased his attention. Dela- 
 ney was of course flattered and ended by telling all that he 
 had done in the case. 
 
 " Ah, Captain Delaney," Price said, " if ever I need a de- 
 tective I shall certainly send for you." 
 
 The extreme sarcasm of this speech was lost upon 
 Delaney, but it amused me infinitely. 
 
 "And now," said I, "I shall leave Mr. Price in your
 
 ANOTHEK LETTER. 
 
 10Q 
 
 hands for a little while, Mr. Sheriff. I will meet you 
 
 later." 
 
 "You must come back and dine with me," said the 
 
 Sheriff; " we dine at one." 
 
 " All right," said I, and I went off to the Squire's, not 
 unwilling to get a chance to talk with Aunt Martha alone. 
 
 "You are an utter stranger and do not know Aunt 
 Martha, so I will tell you about her. She makes her home 
 at the Squire's, but for the last thirty years has wandered 
 hither and thither, turning her hand to whatever is wanted, 
 able, in the estimation of the country people, to do every- 
 thing. A better housekeeper and cook never lived. She 
 is equally good as a nurse or a seamstress. She is a first 
 cousin of Ethel's mother and an old mail with a marvelous 
 clairvoyant faculty of joy or grief and of turning up when 
 she is most wanted. She goes about from house to house, stay- 
 ing as long as she is useful, but taking no pay except her 
 board for any service she renders. She is apt to be blunt 
 and truthful in her speech; her ways are often odd and ec- 
 centric; people laugh at her without malice in their hilarity 
 and without esteeming her the less. In person she is tall 
 and thin, as New England women often are, angular but 
 square shouldered and muscular. Her hair, which is sparse 
 and streaked with gray, is always done up into a tight knot 
 at the back of her head. Her eyes are a dull gray, but much 
 sharper than one would suppose, and are always covered by 
 a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles. Her nose is sharp, her 
 lips thin and her face rather pointed. She is exquisitely 
 neat in her dress, wearing the snowiest collars and cuffs. 
 There is always an odor of lavender, bergamot and sweet 
 marjoram about her, and it is a common remark about the 
 country that the sight and smell of Aunt Martha do as 
 much good to many a sick person as the doctor's medicines. 
 No other ten persons in Pomfret possess half the num-
 
 110 
 
 THE POMFKET MYSTEEY. 
 
 ber of confidences " entrusted to a friend " as Aunt Martha, 
 who, though she lets her tongue run on at a great rate 
 sometimes, never tells what she ought not to tell. She is 
 not a beautiful woman by any means, but has such a good- 
 natured expression on her face, that, after you are accus- 
 tomed to her, you are pleased to have her about. She has 
 an incorrigible habit of commencing her sentence with 
 "Want to know! Du tell!" and other like Yankeeisms. 
 Add to my description that she is fifty years old and you 
 have some sort of an idea of the kind of woman that she is. 
 Well, I went to the Squire's and around to the kitchen 
 door, and got there just as Aunt Martha came out to draw 
 some water from the well/ 
 
 : ' Want to know ! " she said; " is that you, Benny?" 
 ''' Yes, Aunt Martha," said I, " how is Ethel to-day ?" 
 " Bad. Very bad," she answered. " Ain't you heard that 
 her child was born dead this morning ? Want to know I 
 Poor creetur I Doctor says he can't tell whether she'll live 
 or not; thinks she will. She's got a good constitution; all 
 the Wilkinsons have. Her mother was a Wilkinson, you 
 know. Folks say that's where I get my constitution. 
 Sakes alive, how I'm a talkin ! Come into the kitchen." 
 
 " Aunt Martha," said I, " what do you think of Vance's 
 absence ? " 
 
 Aunt Martha stopped in her work and came close up to 
 me and looked me fair and square in the eyes. "Want 
 to know," she said, "what do I think? Well, I'll tell you 
 what I think, only don't go blabbin' it around. I think 
 he's a gone off and ain't a comin' back." 
 ''' You never liked him," I remarked. 
 " No, I never did, though he kind o' slipped round me 
 towards the last," she answered. 
 
 "Do you think Ethel knows about it?" 
 
 " Du tell. Now you've just hit the nail on the head. I
 
 AKOTHER LETTER. 
 
 Ill 
 
 do think that Ethel knows about it, and that that is just 
 what the matter is. Looks to me as if it was her husband's 
 going off that's pretty nigh killed her." 
 
 " Aunt Martha, did you hear any noise that night?" 
 " Not a sound, Benny, not a sound. I generally sleep 
 pretty light too. But then I was in the wing and pretty 
 tired that night, for I had been a settin' up with Hetty 
 Bowman's husband, him as fell from the hay mow in his barn 
 the other day and broke his collar bone, and I guess I slept 
 sounder than usual." 
 
 " Did the Squire hear anything." 
 
 " Says he didn't hear a sound. But then the Squire's old, 
 you know, and, I think, gettin' a little deef, so I don't think 
 its likely that any ordinary noise would wake him. But 
 I guess Ethel was waked and saw something that has taken 
 away her wits for a while." 
 
 " Is there anything I can do for her?" 
 " Want to know ! Now see here, Benny, you always liked 
 Ethel. Afore that Vance came I used to think you and 
 she would hitch up and make a pair, but he got around her 
 with his city manners. For you wern't the same then, 
 Benny, that you are now after two years of city life. Seems 
 funny for you to ask me that question, for I guess there's 
 only one thing you can do for her, and that's the last thing 
 that you'll want to do, and that is to bring her husband 
 back to her." 
 
 " You're right, Aunt Martha, it won't be any too pleas- 
 ant, but I'll try to do it." 
 
 Aunt Martha came right up and kissed me. I was so as- 
 tonished that you could have knocked me over with a 
 feather. So was she, for it had been the impulse of the 
 moment. 
 
 "Well, never mind, Benny," she said, blushing, "I've 
 known you from a baby and kissed you many a tune then.
 
 112 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 But don't you go and tell any of the men folks, or else they'll 
 get the laugh on me." 
 
 Fortunately just then I heard the voice of the Sheriff 
 and Price outside, and in a few hurried words I told Aunt 
 Martha the truth about him. 
 
 "Want to know ! Don't you worry, I won't tell a soul 
 about him. Let me get a look at him. " And she ran to 
 the window where she could see them. " Du tell ! So 
 that's the celebrated Price that got all the money back for 
 the Quincy Bank. He's mighty sharp, though, saw me 
 looking out of the window at him. He's a comin' this way. 
 Oh, Benny, what shall I do, I ain't fit to be seen by com- 
 pany." 
 
 " Never mind, Aunt Martha," said I laughing, for sure 
 enough the Sheriff and Price were coming to the kitchen 
 door, " give him a glass of milk and a doughnut and he 
 will like you better than if you were dressed in silks and 
 satins." 
 
 Aunt Martha bustled into the pantry and emerged with 
 a plate of doughnuts in one hand and a pitcher of milk in 
 the other just as the two men entered. Sheriff Delaney 
 was about to introduce the detective in his grand way, but 
 Price, who took in the situation in a moment, stopped him 
 and said: 
 
 " I don't feel as if I needed any introduction to Miss 
 Martha Wilkinson. Why, madam, Mr. Moore has told me 
 so often about you and your good deeds that I feel as if I 
 had known you for a long time." 
 
 That's lie number two, I thought. Price must be get- 
 ting interested in the case. 
 
 Aunt Martha blushed and smiled with pleasure at being 
 known to the detective and offered him the milk and the 
 doughnuts. 
 
 "Thank you, madam. Thank you," he said, "it does
 
 ANOTHER LETTER. 
 
 113 
 
 one good to taste pure country milk again, but the Sheriff 
 was just agoin' to show the bank where the robbery occurred, 
 and if you'll permit me I'll step in there for a minute and 
 take a look around and then come in here again." 
 
 So saying he was out into the hall in a minute, and when 
 Delaney and I followed, which we did immediately, he was 
 at the foot of the stairs at the door leading into the bank. 
 
 The Sheriff opened the door, which was not locked, and 
 ushered us into the bank Price went softly over the desks, 
 looked into the drawers, found a few scraps of torn papers 
 in one of the waste paper baskets, which he took up and 
 slipped into his pocket, went quickly over the windows and 
 their fastenings, examined the door back of the bank 
 and then came fcack to the vault and took a look at the 
 doors of the safe. 
 
 Then the Sheriff left him for a minute and went to the 
 Directors' room. Quick as a flash, but quietly as a cat, Price 
 was at the locks of the safe. He pushed one tumbril here, 
 another there, and turned the handle. The bolts slipped 
 backwards and forwards noiselessly. He slipped the tumbrils 
 out of place again and turning to me with gleam of delight 
 in his eyes said, 
 
 "I thought so." 
 
 For my part I was greatly surprised. 
 
 Going out Price was half way up the stairs before we 
 could stop him. He came down with apologies; said he 
 thought that was the way to the kitchen. As we went 
 through the hall, the Sheriff leading, Price stooped down 
 and began picking at something in the carpet on the floor. 
 
 " That's a pity/' he said; " how did it come there?" 
 
 I looked down and saw drops of wax. " I am sure I don't 
 know," said I. 
 
 " You know of course ! " said Price looking at the Sheriff. 
 
 "I? Oh no ! A mere trifle a mere trifle."
 
 114 THE POMF&ET MYSTE&Y. 
 
 Price rose up immediately. I thought he was going to 
 say something, but instead he only went on into the 
 kitchen. 
 
 I cannot tell how it came about, but in fifteen minutes 
 Aunt Martha with a hot flat iron, and Price with a sheet of 
 newspaper, were down on their knees taking the grease from 
 the carpet. I know Price began by praising the milk and 
 doughnuts and, speaking about the neatness of the house, 
 mentioned the grease spots in the hall. 
 
 They were absent about a quarter of an hour and the 
 Sheriff was getting rather impatient, so I offered him a cigar 
 to keep him in good humor and we went out on the back 
 porch to smoke. 
 
 When Price joined us he was very thoughtful, but after a 
 glance at the Sheriff he changed his mood. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Mr. Sheriff," he said; "but when I 
 was a small boy I used to help my mother about the house, 
 and it is really a pleasure to do a little housework again. 
 We all have our failings, Mr. Sheriff, and I confess that 
 home life is one of mine; I trust you will excuse me for leav- 
 ing you. " 
 
 This apology put the Sheriff into good humor again. He 
 felt that the stranger was deferring to his superior wisdom, 
 and he then very graciously asked us if he could show us 
 anything else. 
 
 In half a minute Price had looked back in his memory to 
 the report of the Sheriff and found that there had been an 
 examination of the station master. 
 
 " There is not anything else, Mr. Sheriff," he said; "you 
 have been very kind in showing me about, now I'll just step 
 over to the telegraph office and send a word or two to New 
 York. Don't trouble yourself to come over, Mr. Moore 
 will show me the way, and then we'll step back to your 
 house and accept your invitation to dinner at one. "
 
 ANOTHER LETTER. 115 
 
 "Well," said Price, as we were crossing over to the depot, 
 " I'll warrant that when you were a young fellow you thought 
 that man one of the finest police officers and shrewdest de- 
 tectives in the world. But now tell me who is the telegraph 
 operator over here ? " 
 
 I told him. 
 
 " Do you know him ? " he asked. 
 
 " I've known him ever since we were boys together," I an- 
 swered; "whatever telegram you send he will not divulge 
 its contents." 
 
 " And the station agent? Do you know him?" 
 
 " He was born and brought up here." 
 
 " Then give me a chance to have a quiet talk with him." 
 
 I introduced him to Harry Bowne, the station master, and 
 in a few minutes they were deep in conversation about the 
 robbery. Price listened to him very patiently and then said, 
 " Come out, won't you, and show me the exact spot where 
 the engine stood." 
 
 They went out together and I followed after. 
 
 "The engine stood right here," said Bowne; "I was 
 standing there by the telegraph office talking to the con- 
 ductor of the freight train when I first saw him. He was 
 striking a match and my attention was attracted by the 
 light of it. Both he and the engineer of the train lighted 
 their cigars and he stood there talking until the train started, 
 then he came up to me pulling a small leather trunk after 
 him. He asked me if I was the watchmen and I told him 
 I was the station agent. He said he came from Pawtucket 
 and wanted to get to Boston early. I asked him why he had 
 not taken last night's train on the Massachusetts road. He 
 said he had missed it there by a few minutes and that the 
 station agent there had told him that if he could get to 
 Pomf ret he could catch the New York sleeping train, which 
 was due in Boston about 5:30. That then the freight
 
 116 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 train had come along and the engineer had brought him 
 down on the engine." 
 
 " Did you stand still all this time ? " asked Price. 
 
 " Oh no ! " said Bowne. " I put his trunk into the bag- 
 gage room and we walked up and down the platform until 
 the train came along. He was smoking and he gave me a 
 cigar." 
 
 " What did you do with it ? " This was asked humorously. 
 
 " Smoked it of course." 
 
 " Then let me offer you another." 
 
 " Thank you." 
 
 " I'm afraid it's not as good as the one the stranger gave 
 
 you." 
 
 "Well that ivas a good one. It was a ring one like 
 this." 
 
 "You didn't smoke the ring?" said Price laughing. 
 
 "No! I threw that away." 
 
 Price seemed pretty well satisfied that the station agent 
 had no more information to impart, so he talked on other 
 subjects until the station agent left us. We were walking 
 up and down the platform while Bowne was talking and I 
 noticed that Price kept his eyes closely to the ground. 
 After Bowne had left us Price went back and picked some- 
 thing up and put it in his pocket. 
 
 "What is it "I asked. 
 
 He showed it to me. It was a band off of a cigar. 
 
 " Now," said he to me, " have you anything to do ?" 
 
 I told him I wished to write you. 
 
 "Well," said he, "go and write your letter. I will 
 step in and say a few more words to Aunt Martha. She's 
 the most sensible person I've seen in Pomfret. Stop for me 
 there when you are through and we'll go to the Sheriff's 
 together for dinner; and see if you can't arrange to let me
 
 ONE MOKE LETTER. 117 
 
 hear the reports of the messengers that the bank sent out 
 yesterday." 
 
 So I am writing this letter from Mr. Morrison's office. 
 Good bye. 
 
 Sincerely your partner, 
 BENJAMIN T. MOOKE. 
 
 CHAPTEK XV. 
 
 ONE MOBE LETTER. 
 
 WOODSIDE, April 4th, 18 . 
 To OLIVER LORING, ESQ., etc.: 
 
 DEAR LORING: To continue where I left off. We 
 went to the Sheriff's to dinner. I rather expected to be 
 bored but fortunately was not. Hearing the reports of the 
 messengers took us all the afternoon, so that it was not until 
 four o'clock that Price and myself found ourselves seated in 
 the buggy whirling away towards home. I did not take the 
 direct road but went around through the woods, by way of 
 Haresville, and I think Price enjoyed the drive. Price took 
 much pleasure afterwards in seeing the cows milked, and 
 made friends with all the horses and dogs immediately. 
 
 After tea we were sitting by ourselves in the piazza 
 smoking, when I asked him if he had formed any theory as 
 to the robbery. 
 
 " Well," said he, slowly removing the cigar from his lips, 
 " there are some things about it which I do not understand. 
 To my mind it is clear that the robbery had been planned 
 long before and was done by two or three old hands. I 
 know of two men only who could have accomplished the 
 matter so neatly. But one thing I am very sure about, 
 there was collusion with some one in the bank/' 
 
 " Who was it, do you think?"
 
 118 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 "That I don't know. There can be no doubt that the 
 cashier was fast asleep during the night; the doctor's evi- 
 dence proves that very conclusively. The Squire says he 
 was also asleep we have only his word for it, but then it 
 was not the Squire. My whole experience is at fault if 
 Squire Leslie by word or deed knowingly helped the matter 
 on. None of the directors could have afforded any sub- 
 stantial assistance. Aunt Martha is out of the question. 
 The only two persons who have not satisfactorily accounted 
 for their whereabouts are Mrs. Vance and her husband. 
 She is ill, too ill, of course, to be seen. And her husband is 
 absent. Now give me a description of Mr. Vance." 
 
 " I am not a good man to do that," I answered, " for I 
 confess to a very great prejudice against him." 
 
 " Well, I'll discount that," said Price; " go on and tell me 
 at length about his personal appearance and personal 
 characteristics." 
 
 As I have already described Vance to you, my dear 
 Loring, I need not repeat what I said to Price, but I will 
 only say that he heard me very patiently and was silent for 
 some time after I had finished. Not wishing to disturb 
 him I lighted my cigar afresh it had gone out while I was 
 talking. The burning match made a little circle of light 
 about us, and happening to glance at him I saw that his face 
 wore an abstracted, unusual look. I had but a momentary 
 glance, when the match went out, but the look was such as 
 a hunter might have tracking his game. He would never 
 have allowed his face to so express his thoughts if he had 
 not counted on the darkness as a mask. Still from what 
 I saw I felt confident that he had some one in his mind 
 as the robber. 
 
 At last he spoke, "I wish I knew his exact height and 
 weight," he said. 
 
 " I can give you those/' I answered, " or, to speak more
 
 ONE MOKE LETTEK. 119 
 
 correctly his height and weight three years ago. You see 
 the Fall after he first came here there was the usual and 
 customary fair. There were a lot of us at the Fair-grounds 
 discussing the weight of some cattle and something was 
 then said about the difficulty of guessing at the right weight 
 of men. We therefore made bets as to the weights of 
 various members of the party Vance among the number 
 and went to the scales, where we were weighed. I am quite 
 confident that I put the weights down in a memorandum 
 book which I think I can find upstairs." 
 
 " Would you mind going to look?" asked Price. 
 "Well, see here, Price," I said, "it is evident that you 
 suppose that Vance is in some way connected with the rob- 
 bery. Now I might as well tell you that I was once in love 
 with his wife and do not, for that matter, hate her now. So 
 once for all I tell you now that I shall not knowingly give 
 you any information which may tend to injure her or her 
 husband. I fear I have already said too much, and that it 
 would have been better to have let you get your informa- 
 tion elsewhere." 
 
 Price was silent a little while and then he spoke. 
 " I supposed that you might feel like that," he said. " I 
 know all about your love for Ethel Leslie; Aunt Martha 
 did not tell it to me in words, but I guessed it from what 
 she said. But I see I have got to trust you with something 
 I did not mean to tell you. She is under arrest now at her 
 father's house and as soon as she is able to move will be 
 taken to jail." 
 
 " Did you dare to accuse her?" I said angrily. 
 "// No, most assuredly not, but that fool of a Sheriff did 
 before I reached here." 
 
 " She is as innocent as I am," I said warmly. 
 " That I am positive of," said Price; " but at the same 
 time there is no doubt in my mind that she has known
 
 120 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 something about the robbery and that the shock of that 
 knowledge is what has brought about her illness. The 
 Doctor agrees with me in that, although he would stake his 
 life on her innocence." 
 
 I confess that I was stunned at what Price had said. 
 " Now that I have told you so much," continued Price, 
 " I shall tell you what I discovered while I was with Aunt 
 Martha cleansing the carpet in the hall of those grease spots. 
 In the first place the grease spots lay in a cluster on the 
 carpet just away and back from the doorway between the 
 bank and the Squire's house, exactly in the position where 
 a person, standing on the stairs and looking through the 
 glass transom over the door, would have dropped them from 
 a candle held in the hand resting against the banisters. 
 Then again there were no grease spots on the stairs until 
 we came to the step on which such a person would have 
 stood. There we found grease spots again and from that 
 step a line of them led us to Mrs. Vance's door and into her 
 room; to make more certain Aunt Martha brought me the 
 night dress and wrapper worn by Mrs. Vance that night, 
 and there were grease spots on that. Again, the grease spots 
 had a pinkish hue, and Mrs. Vance is the only one who has 
 pink wax candles in her room." 
 
 " But the doctor and Aunt Martha; how could they con- 
 sent to assist you in fastening a knowledge of the crime 
 upon Ethel?" 
 
 " They knew she was innocent, and they knew also that 
 the chances of bringing her reason back were better if they 
 could know what the shock was that had prostrated her. 
 But I have not finished yet. There were grease spots, three 
 in number, on the floor of the bank. Two were close to the 
 safe doors, the third was inside the vault, and those drops 
 of wax were pink." 
 
 " But if Ethel knew of the robbery why did, she not give 
 the alarm ?"
 
 121 
 
 ONE MOEE LETTER. 
 
 I confess that is what puzzles me. But Heel as if I 
 had two things to do; the first is to prove Mrs. Vance mno- 
 "Ihe second is to' find the thieve. And I want vou to 
 
 want her husband's weight and height?' 
 
 I went up stairs, got the book and brought it down open 
 at the pJe where I had jotted down Vance's weigh and 
 height He was five feet, eight and one quartermches tall, 
 and weighed one hundred and fifty-nine pounds 
 
 Well said Price, I should not be surprised if I knew 
 the man.' Let me tell you how. Some fifteen years ago 
 when I was only a novice at detective work a gentleman s 
 country seat up the Hudson was robbed. Barney Jacob^ 
 who was the best detective we ever had on the New York 
 force, was detailed and asked for me to assist him We cap- 
 tured the thief and turned him over to the authorities at 
 Poughkeepsie and they let him go; or at all events he 
 Lfhow escaped from jail. That fellow was a good look- 
 ing young man about thirty-one. He made a good haul of 
 jewels and silverware, none of which was recovered He 
 played the organ in the country church, gave young ladies 
 singing and music lessons and taught them painting and so 
 had the run of the house. After his escape from the 
 Poughkeepsie authorities he went to Europe but we never 
 could hear of him in one place long enough to extradite 
 him Six years afterwards he suddenly appeared in this 
 country as one of the robbers of the Seaside Bank of Hart- 
 ford That time we got upon his track and nearly caught 
 him, but he gave us the slip and got away to South America, 
 where there were no extradition treaties." 
 ' ' And his name ? " I faltered. 
 
 "He has several names-Robert Morrow, Gregory Wil, 
 jams, Charles Siebert and now Arthur Vance,"
 
 122 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " But it is impossible, " said I. " The Squire went to 
 New York and found out all about him. " 
 
 " A trick easily enough played/' Price answered. " Aunt 
 Martha gave me the names and places where the Squire 
 went and I have sent them to New York. But it is hardly 
 worth while, for the people whom the Squire saw will have 
 left long before this. The man who left by the 4:15 train 
 for Boston was Vance disguised. Or at all events he carried 
 a pocket full of just such cigars as Vance smoked when at 
 home. Aunt Martha gave me one of his cigars little 
 dreaming what I wanted it for. It had a band about it-*-a 
 genuine Havana band the cigars that bear that band never 
 cost less than twenty cents a piece. I picked up three simi- 
 lar bands this morning. Two I found near where the 
 freight engine was standing, the other near the telegraph 
 office. One of those bands came from the cigar which the 
 stranger smoked, the second came from the cigar which the 
 engineer smoked, the third came from the cigar which 
 the station master smoked." 
 
 " But how about his coming from Pawtucket?" I asked. 
 
 " He never came from Pawtucket. He got to the station 
 as the freight engine came in, stayed talking to the engineer 
 until the train left, then went to the station master, who 
 accepted the story as it was told him. The beard, etc. , were 
 ordinary disguises. There were evidently two men who 
 helped him. They were the two men that Ezra Cummins 
 got on the track of and then lost. I have the name of the 
 engine driver who drove the engine that night, and will have 
 him interviewed by an acquaintance of mine, but it is hardly 
 necessary, for the man who took the 4:15 train never came 
 from Pawtucket. Now I'm going to bed. I'm sleepy." 
 
 I showed him his room and then came to mine, where I 
 have written you this letter. Good night. / 
 Sincerely your partner, 
 T.
 
 CLUE. 
 
 CHAPTEK XVI. 
 
 A CLUE. 
 
 THE next morning after breakfast Price asked Benny to 
 come up to his room for a few minutes. 
 
 " I want to show you something," said Price when the 
 door was shut behind them, and taking out his pocket-book 
 he took from it some scraps of paper. " Do you remember 
 those? "he said. 
 
 "Yes. I saw you take some scraps of paper out of a 
 waste basket, and I suppose those are they." 
 
 " You are right. Now, I amused myself last night putting 
 those scraps together and I'll put them together for you. 
 You see they are numbered on the back. I did that for 
 my convenience in rearranging them. This strip of paper 
 has evidently been torn from a larger sheet for the purpose 
 of having a memorandum made upon it. Here are the 
 figures composing the memorandum," and Price arranged 
 the pieces so that Benny read upon the whole strip, " 2 4 , 
 
 978 cs -i 1 
 
 * ' ' > ^ * '4- 
 
 " Well," said Price, " what do you make out of it f 
 
 "Nothing," answered Benny; "the figures are plain 
 enough, but their bearing on the robbery is not." 
 
 Price shook his head mournfully. " I am disappointed 
 in you," he said, " I thought you would know that those 
 figures are the memorandum of the combination of the safe." 
 
 "Very likely." 
 
 " That memorandum," continued Price, hardly noticing 
 Benny's interruption, "in my opinion was left somewhere 
 jn the bank by previous arrangement, so that the burglars
 
 124 THE POMFEET M-YSTEKY. 
 
 could get into the bank without using force. You noticed 
 that the locks worked all right after I had pushed the tum- 
 brils into place." 
 
 Benny nodded. 
 
 " Well, those tumbrils were intentionally put out to make 
 it appear that force was used. Now let us see who knew 
 of the combination that night." 
 
 " The Squire and the Cashier," said Benny. 
 
 " Do you know the handwriting of either of them?" 
 
 " I know the Squire's handwriting very well, he never 
 wrote those figures. You know I studied law in his office." 
 
 " Do you know the Cashier's?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Well, we can find his entries on the books of the bank 
 and compare them with these figures." 
 
 " But perhaps that is an old memorandum." 
 
 " If it is, then how came it in the waste basket yesterday ? " 
 
 " Can't you find out what the combination was last Wed- 
 nesday night." 
 
 " I would like to, but I'm afraid to ask directly or I may 
 alarm the Squire or the Cashier." 
 
 " Well, suppose I try to find out." 
 
 " I wish you would, Benny." 
 
 When Benny Moore came to town he did ask, and both 
 the Squire and the Cashier gave him the same figures; 
 7 4 , 28 s , 8 a , 6 '. Price looked glum when Benny told him. 
 
 " It doesn't shake my belief that the memorandum was 
 really put there for the purpose we supposed," he said; 
 " but it shows that every precaution has been taken to pre- 
 vent discovery." 
 
 " Then you think that the Squire and .the Cashier have 
 given the wrong combination." 
 
 " That's what I do think." 
 
 " Is there any way to prove it?"
 
 A CLUB. 125 
 
 " No ! We are balked there." 
 
 " What will you do now?" 
 
 " I'll have the cashier shadowed; perhaps time will bring 
 us more information." 
 
 The Sheriff met the two men on the corner and greeted 
 them very warmly. " Well," he said, " I have a list here 
 of the stolen securities. I'll give you each one if you like; 
 we've had a whole lot printed." 
 
 " Have you sent any off?" asked Benny. 
 
 "Yes, to all the newspapers and to every banker and 
 broker in the country." 
 
 " And how is Mrs. Vance this morning?" 
 
 "Well, the Doctor says she's about the same, and, by- 
 the-way, her husband will be back the day after to-morrow. 
 The Squire got a telegram from him this morning." 
 
 " Indeed ! Where was he?" 
 
 " In Chicago. He saw the robbery of the bank in the 
 newspapers and started right away." 
 
 " Don't let us detain you, Sheriff." 
 
 " Well, good day." 
 
 " Good day." 
 
 " Now," said Price, as the Sheriff left them, " let us go 
 over to the telegraph office and get the answer to the 
 message I sent yesterday." 
 
 There were several telegrams for the detective. One said 
 that the engineer denied having had any passenger on his 
 engine on Thursday morning. Another reported that 
 Vance's references in New York still lived in the same houses 
 and were well known respectable people, beyond reproach. 
 
 When they got outside Price said to Benny: " We have 
 a deep rogue to deal with. It will be no easy task to solve 
 the mystery." 
 
 "What will you do next?" 
 
 " I shall go to Boston for a day or two to see if I can get 
 a clue to the stranger."
 
 126 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 Price left that afternoon and Benny, after visiting Aunt 
 Martha, went home. 
 
 Aunt Martha was really very much worried about the 
 Squire. A feeling had grown up in the town, no one knew 
 how or why, that the Squire was in some way responsible 
 for the robbery. Hard looks and half disguised reproaches 
 met him everywhere as he walked abroad, and his daughter's 
 very serious condition weighed upon him. His life had 
 hitherto been so full and bustling as to afford but few 
 breathing spells; he had been pulled a dozen ways at once, 
 and now, as Aunt Martha saw the robbery, and failure of the 
 bank, depriving him of all his property and leaving him de- 
 pendent on herself and his daughter, would force him to a 
 life of comparative idleness. He had always stood so high, 
 too, in the respect of his fellow townsfolk that it was now 
 very hard upon him to be treated with aversion and distrust. 
 He was too old, moreover, to seek to rebuild his shattered 
 fortunes. 
 
 Vance got back early on Monday morning. He expressed 
 great horror at the robbery of the bank, and was nearly 
 prostrated at the news of his wife's illness. His anxiety to 
 know the cause and probable effect of it was too genuine to 
 be doubted and won him at once the sympathy of the popu- 
 lace. 
 
 About noon on the day of Vance's arrival Sheriff Delaney, 
 much puzzled and perplexed at his inability to solve the 
 mystery which shrouded the robbery of the bank, was pass- 
 ing down the street in his way from his house to the tavern. 
 His errand led him past the post office and he nodded to 
 the jolly/ red-faced postmaster as he passed. The post- 
 master saw him and beckoned to him to stop, and so the 
 Sheriff went in. 
 
 " I have a letter for you, Sheriff," said he, putting on his 
 spectacles and hunting through the pile of letters and news-
 
 A CLUE. 12 
 
 papers on his table. " The mail has just come and I hain't 
 had time to sort 'em out yet, but I seed your name as I 
 poured 'em out o' the bag. It must be here somewhere. 
 Ah, this is it." 
 
 The Sheriff took the letter and looked it over carefully. 
 "Boston," he said, examining the postmark. 
 
 The envelope was soiled and crumpled, and the address 
 was composed of letters cut from a newspaper and pasted on 
 the envelope, not neatly, for the gum had been smeared 
 around them. 
 
 " It's a queer kind o' letter, ain't it ? " said the postmaster, 
 eyeing him over his spectacles. 
 
 The Sheriff tore the envelope open and took out a half 
 sheet of soiled notepaper. It bore no date nor address, but 
 printed across its face in sprawling straggling letters were 
 these words: " Luk between the fift an sixt tres sefent ro 
 in Beny Mores orcherd ask him how they kam ther Luk 
 fust ask him arterwuds. A frend." 
 
 The Sheriff turned the paper over and looked at the back 
 of it as if that would give him an idea of the meaning of 
 this strange epistle. Then he took up the envelope and 
 looked at that again. 
 
 " Suthin' important?" queried the post-master. 
 
 " Yes, something very important," answered the Sheriff, 
 as he folded the letter, put it in the envelope, and the en- 
 velope in his pocket, and hurried out. 
 
 " Never seed the Capting in sich a hurry afore," solilo- 
 quized the postmaster as he went to the door and watched 
 the receding figure of the Sheriff. "Well, I must be a 
 sortin' my mail. Guess it was suthin' about the robbery." 
 
 Full of the importance of the new information the 
 Sheriff hurried down to Lawyer Morrison's office. 
 
 "Is Mr. Morrison in?" he asked of the clerk in the 
 outer room.
 
 128 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " He's busy just now, Captain, but he'll be at leisure in 
 a minute." 
 
 "Who's with him?" 
 
 "Mr. Vance. " 
 *" About the bank ?" 
 
 " Yes ! I guess so ! Queer thing that there ain't no clue 
 to the robbers, ain't it?" 
 
 " Well, if I was you I wouldn't be in no such hurry to say 
 there wasn't a clue. Now you just go in and tell Mr. 
 Morrison and Mr. Vance that I want to see them impor- 
 tant." 
 
 In a few minutes the Sheriff was shown into Mr. Morri- 
 son's private office. 
 
 Never before had Captain Delaney stood more erect, 
 never had he given a more angular military salute than he 
 did now, never had his face been so stern and magisterial. 
 He felt the importance of his communication tingling in 
 every fiber of his body. Both Vance and Mr. Morrison 
 could not help smiling at his manner. 
 
 " Take a chair, Mr. Delaney," said the lawyer; " you 
 wanted to see us; have you heard anything new ? " 
 
 For answer the Sheriff unbuttoned his coat and taking 
 the letter from his pocket handed it to him. 
 
 The lawyer put on his glasses, looked at the address, 
 opened it and took out and read the letter. A look of 
 amazement passed over his features and the Sheriff noted 
 it with satisfaction. He made no remark, however, but 
 handed it to Vance, who read it over slowly aloud. 
 
 Then Vance laid the letter on the table and looked at his 
 companions. Neither of them spoke. 
 
 "Well," he said, at last breaking the silence, "what do 
 you think of it ? " 
 
 " I think we'd better look," said the Sheriff. 
 
 " It would be hardly worth while," said the lawyer; " I
 
 A CLTJE. 129 
 
 have known Benny since his childhood; such a thing is im- 
 possible. " 
 
 " It can do no harm to look, though I do not helieve that 
 anything will come of it/' said Vance. 
 
 " I suppose not," answered the lawyer; " you will go with 
 the Sheriff, Mr. Vance?" 
 
 " I had rather not. From little things that I have heard 
 I am inclined to think that Mr. Moore has been trying to 
 throw suspicion on my wife and me, and under these cir- 
 cumstances I do not wish to go to his father's place on this 
 errand. I think you had better go." 
 
 " It is a useless errand, but I suppose I ought to go." 
 
 "After all the letter is anonymous and every one has 
 enemies. Even if you find anything it will prove nothing 
 against him if he is able to account for his whereabouts at 
 the time of the robbery." 
 
 " Do we want a warrant? " said the Sheriff. 
 
 " No," said the lawyer. " If Benny knows that we sus- 
 pect him he will come with us without a warrant and the 
 formalities of law can be gone through with afterward. 
 Besides I should not wish to apply for a warrant on the 
 sole evidence of an anonymous letter." 
 
 In a short time the Sheriff and the lawyer drove into the 
 stable yard at Woodside. They found Andy at work wash- 
 ing a buggy. 
 
 " Mr. Moore, or Benny, at home ? " asked the lawyer. 
 
 " No, sir. They've gone over to Stockton." 
 
 " We want to go into the orchard a little while, Andy," 
 said the lawyer; " will you hitch the horse?" 
 
 "Yes, sir. Do you want me to go with you?" 
 
 " No, thank you," said the lawyer, " we'll go alone." 
 
 " Now, I wonder what those two want in the orchard," 
 soliloquized Andy as he fastened the hitching strap to a post; 
 " guess it's no harm a lookin' at them anyhow." So saying
 
 130 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 he applied his eye to a knot hole that commanded a view of 
 the orchard. 
 
 " There they are/' he continued to himself as the two 
 men appeared around the corner of the barn. " Golly ! 
 If the Sheriff hain't taken down the shovel from the cart 
 shed. Now they go down among the trees counting them, 
 as sure as I'm alive. An' now they stop an' go to talking. 
 The Sheriff sees suthin' on the ground; he's a pointin' to 
 it. Gosh all hemlock ! if he ain't a diggin'. Well, I'll be 
 durned," he said aloud, as he looked around to see if any- 
 one saw him at his peephole, " if I ain't a forgot to put the 
 blanket on the Sheriff's horse. I'll do so now," and he 
 went and blanketed the horse and returned to his watch. 
 "Sheriff's still a diggin'. An' now he's stopped. Guess 
 he ain't done so much diggin' since he was a boy. Hullo ! 
 he's a bringin' suthin' up out of the hole. Look's like a 
 box. Yes, it is a box . There a sittin' down now to look 
 at it. Wonder what's in it. Well, they've got through at 
 last an' are comin' back. Sheriff might ha' filled in the 
 hole though, I spose I must do that," and Andy stepped 
 nimbly away from his peephole and resumed his work. 
 
 " We'll wait a little while," said Mr. Morrison, as he came 
 into the stable yard. "Andy, how soon will Mr. Moore and 
 Benny be back ? " 
 
 "Ought to be back very soon now, sir; they've been 
 gone most three hours." 
 
 When Benny returned the lawyer took him aside and said 
 to him: 
 
 " Benny, would you mind telling me where you were on 
 the last Wednesday night." 
 
 " The night of the robbery?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Here. Why?" 
 
 " Can you find any one who knows you were here at the 
 time of the robbery ? "
 
 THE TEtAL. f 131 
 
 " Good God ! Mr. Morrison, you don't suspect me ? " 
 
 ' I am sorry to say, Benny, that we have received in- 
 formation accusing you of the crime and that part of the 
 securities stolen from the bank were found in your father's 
 orchard. It is very slight evidence against you, but I shall 
 feel obliged to ask you to come back with us unless some one 
 can speak positively as to your being in the house between 
 twelve and five on Thursday morning." 
 
 " No one can do that, of course. Every one was asleep. 
 Do you want me to go with you right away ? " . 
 
 " I think you had better, and your father had best come 
 also; we may want him for your bail." 
 
 "Hullo! Andy!" cried Benny, "put Duke back into 
 the buggy. We're going to Pomfret." 
 
 The party appeared before Judge Maxwell in Pomfret. 
 
 " I am very sorry, Mr. Moore," said the magistrate, " and 
 have no doubt but that your innocence will be clearly es- 
 tablished, but under the circumstances I feel it my duty to 
 hold you. But I will take bail in ten thousand dollars and 
 accept your father as surety. The bail is small, but then 
 the evidence is very slight. Mr. Moore, you have my best 
 wishes for your early and complete vindication." 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE TKIAL. 
 
 IT was late in the Autumn when the great trial came off 
 at last the trial remembered so many years as the greatest 
 event in the annals of Pomfret township the trial of 
 Benjamin Moore for robbing the Pomfret Bank. 
 
 The court room was crowded. Men and women had 
 waited from early in the morning to get seats in the hall,
 
 132 THE POMFRET MTSTEET. 
 
 and long before the court was opened every available stand- 
 ing place was occupied and there were groups outside under 
 the opened windows. Women talked gossip and fanned 
 themselves, the men stood, closely packed together in a 
 noisy perspiring crowd. 
 
 To those who waited it seemed a long while before the 
 vacant space set aside for the members of the bar, the wit- 
 nesses and the counsel, showed signs of life. Then one or 
 two of the country lawyers strolled in and took their seats. 
 Then some of the witnesses came in and were handed chairs 
 by the constables in attendance, and finally in came the 
 Squire with Aunt Martha leaning on his arm. 
 
 Each successive arrival was greeted by a loud buzz of 
 conversation, in which his or her name could be heard. As 
 the side door by which these persons entered was seen to 
 swing open an expectant hush fell upon the spectators, if 
 it was but one of the court attendants coming in there was 
 a murmur of disappointment; if some one connected with 
 the case, speculation was rife as to what part he had to fill. 
 
 Finally the counsel for the defense came in, chatting 
 pleasantly with the prosecuting attorney, and shortly after- 
 wards the judges entered, and bowing to the assembled 
 lawyers, took seats on the bench. 
 
 Then the court crier made his proclamation, and, at the 
 " Oyez ! Oyez ! Oyez ! " of his call a deep silence fell upon 
 the multitude. 
 
 Then came the prisoner, who, bowing to the magistrates, 
 took his seat and the jury was chosen. 
 
 The prosecuting attorney opened the case, and his speech 
 detailed the robbery of the bank and the events connected 
 therewith, and a brief outline of what he intended to prove. 
 
 Then the first witness, Squire Leslie, was called to the 
 witness box and sworn. 
 
 His testimony was very brief. He described the discovery
 
 THE TRIAL. 133 
 
 of the robbery of the bank, and identified certain papers as 
 having been the bank's property. He also told how he had 
 met the prisoner before and after the robbery. That was 
 all. 
 
 The counsel for the prisoner asked him but few questions. 
 
 " Who locked the safe on the night before the robbery?" 
 
 " Ephraim Chester, the cashier, in my presence." 
 
 " Did you see the combination with which the safe was 
 locked?"" 
 
 "No." 
 
 " "Who knew of that combination." 
 
 " The cashier and myself I suppose." 
 
 " Would you swear that only you two knew it?" 
 
 " No. I swear that I knew it and that I told no one 
 what it was. That is all that I can swear to." 
 
 " What was the reputation of the prisoner up to the time 
 of the robbery ? " 
 
 " The very best in the world." 
 
 Then the prosecutor rose with one question only in re- 
 direct. 
 
 " What was the combination referred to?" 
 
 CC ry 4 QQ a Q i }) 
 
 i , M , 8 , b . 
 
 Then the next witness was called and the Cashier took 
 his stand. He was very nervous, but that is an ordinary 
 sensation in witnesses. He testified that he had locked 
 the safe; told what the combination had been; and swore 
 positively to the fact that he had given it to no one, except 
 the Squire. 
 
 He was not cross-examined. 
 
 Then the Sheriff was put upon the stand and detailed his 
 investigations. 
 
 When, in his testimony, he told about the anonymous 
 letter and described the finding of the box there was a deep 
 silence through the court room. When he produced the
 
 134' THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 letter there was a movement of the crowd as they craned 
 their necks to get a sight of it. 
 
 The prisoner's lawyer asked but one question. 
 
 " What was the character of the prisoner before the rob- 
 bery?" 
 
 "The best possible." 
 
 Then, at the summons of the crier, Doctor Gamble took 
 the stand. He described the condition of Mrs. Vance and 
 gave it as his opinion that she was suffering from some 
 severe mental shock received on the night of the robbery. 
 Her mind had not yet recovered its normal condition. 
 
 Then the prosecuting attorneys put a question which 
 showed to the crowd their theory of their case. 
 
 " Would the mental condition described by you be likely 
 to result if Mrs. Vance had seen through the transom of 
 the door an old schoolmate, an old lover, engaged in robbing 
 the bank." 
 
 The judges looked at the prisoner's attorneys, who rose 
 and said, that though they might have grounds to object 
 to the form of the question, yet as they had been specially 
 instructed by the prisoner at the bar to allow all the testi- 
 mony which the other side could produce to enter the 
 record, therefore, confident in the innocence of their client, 
 they made no objection. 
 
 The answer came solemnly and slowly: " It would." 
 
 Again was the question asked; " What was the character 
 of the prisoner before the robbery ? " 
 
 Again came the answer, " The best possible." 
 
 Then Aunt Martha was called to the stand. 
 
 She told what she knew, and detailed the finding of the 
 wax spots on the carpet and in the bank. Her testimony 
 was new to the spectators and they listened in silent atten- 
 tion. Her cross-examination was longer. 
 
 " What was the color of the wax spots?" she was asked.
 
 THE TEIAL. 
 
 135 
 
 "Pink." 
 
 " Was the color of the spots in the bank and on the carpet 
 
 the same?" 
 
 " They were. Apparently they were of the same wax." 
 
 " Were there candles in the Squire's house of a similar 
 color; and if so where were they kept?" 
 
 " In Mrs. Vance's room and there only." 
 
 " What was the reputation of the prisoner before the rob- 
 bery?" 
 
 " The best possible." 
 
 Then the prosecution closed their case and the defense 
 opened. 
 
 The prisoner was sworn on his own behalf and gave his 
 testimony. He was cross-examined at some length, but 
 nothing tending to fix the crime upon him was elicited. 
 
 Then Mr. and Mrs. Moore were in turn examined and 
 testified that Benny had gone to bed and had been up the 
 next morning. Only one question on cross-examination was 
 important. 
 
 " Had the dogs barked that night?" 
 
 " Not that they remembered." 
 
 " Would they be likely to bark if strangers had been in 
 the orchard ? " 
 
 " They would." 
 
 Then Price took the stand and told how Benny had sent 
 for him, and how he had come and what he had found. 
 
 Alas ! for Benny, all the detective's searches away from 
 Pomf ret had been barren of results. 
 
 Then Andy was examined as to the condition of the horses 
 and wagons the next morning and the defense closed. 
 
 Then in rebuttal and at his own request Arthur Vance 
 was called. Unjust suspicion had been put upon him by 
 the detective's testimony and he desired to clear himself. 
 He had been in Chicago, and knew nothing of the robbery
 
 136 THE POMFKET MYSTEKY. 
 
 until he had seen an account of it in the papers. He 
 showed the telegram received by the Squire, and asserted 
 that dozens of people would testify to having seen and 
 talked with him in Chicago. 
 
 The Oliver Loring rose and addressed the jury on behalf 
 of the accused. He showed how slight the evidence was on 
 which the prosecution rested their case. Showed how 
 impossible it was that any wax from the candles in Mrs. 
 Vance's room could have been dropped by Benny Moore in 
 the bank, and asked who, among all that vast audience, 
 could prove by the testimony of a third person that he had 
 rested quietly in his bed all the night through. 
 
 It was a fervid, impassioned, but thoroughly logical ad- 
 dress, and when after speaking for an hour, he closed, there 
 was not a soul in the hall that thought Benny Moore guilty 
 of the crime of which he was accused. 
 
 But then the prosecuting attorney arose, and clearly and 
 concisely began his address. He pointed out to the jury 
 that the prisoner after an absence of more than two years 
 had suddenly returned to Pomfret. He dwelt long and 
 seriously on the fact that the dogs had not been heard bark- 
 ing on the night of the robbery, and went over every detail 
 of the evidence about the finding of the box in the orchard. 
 He passed on to the illness of Ethel Vance and grew im- 
 passioned as he described the feelings of a woman who 
 should see an old and valued friend engaged in nefarious 
 burglary. And when he closed the audience were divided 
 in their opinions. 
 
 The judge made his charge to the jury, leaning first to 
 one side and then to the other, and then the jury retired. 
 
 They were out for two hours and when they came 
 into court the vast audience listened intently for their ver- 
 dict as it came like a knell through the silence. 
 
 "GUILTY."
 
 ETHEL'S ILLNESS. 137 
 
 Guilty, and Benny Moore was convicted of the crime. 
 
 The prisoner's lawyers moved promptly for a stay, which 
 was granted, and then the judges left the bench and the 
 vast audience streamed out of the court room to spread the 
 news far and wide that Benny Moore had been found guilty 
 of robbing the Pomfret Bank. 
 
 And all the while she, whose few words would have lifted 
 from him the black cloud of dishonor that shadowed him, 
 lay helpless upon the bed of sickness. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 ETHEL'S ILLNESS. 
 
 YES, Ethel lay helpless upon a bed of sickness, and her 
 wandering mind knew nothing of the tragic events that 
 were transpiring, knew not that a man had been dashed 
 clown from the high pedestal of honor which he had so 
 proudly occupied; knew not that the home at Woodside 
 where she had so often gone, had been plunged into deepest 
 grief. 
 
 For many days and many weary nights Ethel Vance lay 
 helplessly upon her bed, in dull unconsciousness, or worse 
 yet, and far more frequently, in that dim and half perceptive 
 state which leaves only unrest and weariness. It seemed 
 often as if it were a mere matter of chance, whether her 
 slumber was ever to be broken by the flush of Life, or was 
 simply to sink, and deepen and expand into the long sleep 
 of Death. 
 
 " Sleep," said the Doctor, quoting from one of his favorite 
 authors " Sleep is not always sent on missions of refresh- 
 ment; sleep is sometimes the secret chamber in which Death 
 arranges his machinery; sleep is sometimes that deep, mys-
 
 138 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 terious atmosphere in which the human spirit is slowly un- 
 settling its wings for flight from its earthly tenement." 
 
 But the light of the star of life was not yet quenched, 
 though it burned with a faint, wan, sickly glow, and some- 
 times flickered and trembled as if about to fade away; and 
 anon, blazed up clearly and brightly. 
 
 As some mighty convulsion of nature tears the bosom of 
 the earth and disturbs the fountains which have sent their 
 blessings over the parched land, hides the golden sun with 
 clouds of smoke, covers the fertile earth with a mantle of 
 ashes, and rends the rocks into fragments and sends their 
 precious ores in molten streams through crack and crevice; 
 so the great shock wjhich Ethel Vance had undergone had 
 strained the golden cords which bind the spirit to its tene- 
 ment of clay, had scorched the very fountains of her life, 
 seared her soul as if with fire, melted affection from out 
 her heart, and left the place where it had been dark and 
 empty, carpeted with the ashes of dead love and dark with 
 the mephitic vapors of hate. 
 
 From day to day the fever of her blood racked her brain 
 and body; sometimes nature, rallying, would, by an effort, 
 gathering all her forces, shake it off; and then, again, it 
 would sweep upon her and overwhelm her, as the sea sweeps 
 over and submerges the low-lands when the dykes are down. 
 
 Sometimes the hot madness of her blood would summon 
 strange images before her brain, and she would toss about 
 in the wildness of delirium, moaning, and muttering broken, 
 disjointed and unintelligible sentences, ejaculating earnest 
 and yet incomprehensible warnings, as if there was some- 
 thing which the spirit was ever striving for yet ever failing 
 to grasp. 
 
 At other times she lay quiet on her bed, wrapped in a 
 lethargy, with every sense faint and dull, half-conscious of 
 the room wherein she lay, half hearing the faint echoes that ;
 
 ETHEL'S ILLNESS. 139 
 
 came through the open windows from the bustling street, 
 half perceiving the soft airs and odors of the Spring. At 
 such times she had a vague consciousness of the presence 
 of the Doctor, of Aunt Martha or the nurse, as they moved 
 with noiseless steps about the sick room, seeing them vaguely 
 as if in the twilight, recognizing them indistinctly like the 
 uncertain recollection of dream-figures. 
 
 Once only had her husband been allowed to see her, and 
 that time she had shrunk away from him affrighted, and 
 when he had bent over to imprint a kiss upon her brow she 
 had broken out with the madness of delirium into wild 
 upbraidings and revilings trembling with passion and 
 hurling vindictive, incoherent reproaches at him; so that 
 the Doctor forbade him to repeat his visit and his name was 
 never mentioned in her hearing. 
 
 Nor was her father admitted to her presence more than 
 once, for he excited her also, but in a different way. She 
 reproached herself to him for bringing poverty and disgrace 
 upon him, sobbed and raved and wept in a delirium of re- 
 proach. 
 
 Thus in that room was fought a long, hard struggle with 
 Death, unt.il at last, slowly and sullenly, he retired de- 
 feated. But for many weeks afterwards Ethel lay weak 
 and helpless as a child. Nought was said to her about the 
 events of the past few months; no questions were asked her 
 as to what she had seen; she was too weak. 
 
 None who knew the bright, cheerful Ethel of other days 
 would have recognized her now in the pale emaciated form 
 upon the bed. Her eyes had sunken deep into their sockets, 
 the lines about her mouth had grown deep and stern, and 
 the lips had lost their curve and grown straight and hard as 
 if continually compressed with pain, and her hair, cut close 
 during her illness, was growing out again white as the snow. 
 And as she grew stronger, there showed gradually more
 
 140 THE POMFBET MYSTERY. 
 
 and more, a similar change in her nature. She seemed not 
 to care for life, to be passive in the hands of Aunt Martha 
 and Doctor Gamble. 
 
 So the days went by until she was able to bear the outer 
 air and to sit in the warm sun-light of the porch. 
 
 She had not seen her husband again. As she recovered 
 strength she had been asked if she would see him, but she 
 had always refused. She seemed to feel a strong antipathy 
 to him, but she gave no reasons, only a firm emphatic re- 
 fusal that there was no disputing. Indeed, the only thing 
 which seemed to have any influence over her so far as in- 
 ducing her to exert herself to get better was the hope of 
 getting away, and every day she asked the Doctor whether 
 she was not able to be moved. 
 
 But as she grew stronger, and could talk more freely, and 
 as she questioned Aunt Martha and the Doctor about what 
 had happened, and they told her that her idea of the rob- 
 bery of the bank was but the vision of a troubled mind, and 
 let her see that people still came and went into the brick 
 building next door (for the new bank had made that its 
 headquarters, though the old doorway into the Squire's 
 house had been bricked up), she grew more kind to her 
 husband and strove to destroy the prejudice that she had 
 against him, as if it were a morbid fancy of her illness. 
 And he, by all means in his power, aided her. Had he been 
 a lover seeking to win her maiden love he could not have 
 been more thoughtful nor more delicate in his attentions. 
 So in time her dislike slumbered, and a faint shadow of the 
 old love ventured to show itself. 
 
 Still there was danger of a relapse if by any means she 
 should hear that her dream was true, and so both the 
 Doctor and Vance were anxious that she should leave Pom- 
 fret. She was still weak when the move was determined 
 upon, but her husband, with care that met with the appro-
 
 ETHEI/S ILLKESS. 141 
 
 bation of all, took upon himself the charge of the arrange- 
 ment. All that money and forethought could procure he 
 procured. 
 
 A special car arrived at the station fitted with every 
 luxury that an invalid would need, and four strong men 
 brought her in a litter from the house to the railroad station. 
 Then without change the private palace car rolled away to 
 Eastern Florida. There she would find a little cottage full 
 of servants ready to do her bidding, furnished and stocked 
 with all that were necessary to her comfort. From the 
 window she could look* out upon the ocean and watch its 
 restless waves and ever-changing surface. 
 
 As she grew stronger there was a comfortable carriage, 
 quiet horses and smooth roads among the forests. And two 
 miles off was a town- where she see could human life and, 
 if she wished, seek human companionship. She did not so 
 wish, her heart was still sore, her mind" too weak to ask for 
 aught else than rest and forgetfulness; the society of the 
 woods and waters was all that she cared for. There was 
 nothing to remind her of Pomfret except her husband. 
 There were new servants in the house black people who 
 had never heard of that New England town and even 
 nature wore a different garb than in her northern house. 
 
 In these new scenes Ethel grew stronger. She was sub- 
 ject to recurring spells of dark horror and fear, but she 
 struggled against them as baseless visions of her illness. 
 
 But the end came at last. Her husband, anxious to 
 amuse her, had persuaded her to drive with him to see a 
 boat race on the neighboring river. She had consented to 
 go. She would cast off her dullness and fight against the 
 disordered remnants of her delirium. She would go out 
 with him and seek recreation in the society of her fellow 
 creatures. She remembered that in one of her trunks there 
 were some new costumes which she had never worn. She 
 would don one of those for the occasion.
 
 142 (TflE tOM^KET 
 
 She called her maid, and the trunk was brought into her 
 sitting room, and opened. There lay the dresses, which now 
 saw the light for the first time since they had been packed 
 up in Pomfret. She told her maid to take them out and 
 spread them where she could see them. How neatly were 
 they wrapped and folded in their brown paper coverings. 
 It was a pleasure to look at them, for what woman does not 
 take pride in her new apparel ? One little parcel there was 
 wrapped in newspaper, and as the maid untied it and threw 
 the paper on the floor Ethel idly picked it up and glanced 
 at it. 
 
 What was this that met her eyes. " The Trial." What 
 trial? She remembered to have heard of no trial. She 
 read on: " Speech of Oliver Loring." Loring? Oliver Lor- 
 ing ? That was the name of Benny's law partner. What 
 was he doing in Pomfret. " Guilty." Who was guilty? 
 She would read and see. 
 
 After the first few lines, she stopped and sent her maid 
 away. She wished no witnesses to the great agony that she 
 felt was closing in around her once again. What she had 
 seen had been no dream, then. The paper before her was 
 real. She crushed it in her hand to make sure that it was 
 tangible. She read over again and again the long account of 
 the trial. She read the testimony of her father and Aunt 
 Martha, of Benny Moore and the detective. She read the 
 testimony of her husband, the addresses of the lawyers, the 
 verdict of the jury. The remembrance of what she had 
 seen again rose clearly and distinctly before her. It was no 
 dream but a sad and terrible reality. And he, her husband, 
 had lied to her; had on the witness stand perjured himself 
 and by his words and deeds condemned an innocent man to 
 ignominy and disgrace. 
 
 She could have forgiven any wrong, any injury, any in- 
 fidelity to herself; but thus to fasten upon an innocent
 
 ETHEL'S ILLNESS. 
 man a crime of which he was not guilty was base, too base for 
 
 t by the window looking out, thinking of what she 
 should do. Within her vision the great waves were rolling 
 up upon the beach, a sea bird was dipping his wings in the 
 blue waves, the broad blaze of the setting sun was gilc 
 
 the earth. . 
 
 She saw none of these things. She saw only a dim room 
 in a jail and a man whose form and figure she well knew 
 hiding his face in his hands. 
 
 She rose silently. Her face was very white and her lips 
 were tightly closed as if with deadly pain. With her own 
 hands she took from the closet a small valise and packed it 
 with such things as she would need upon a journey. 
 took her purse and deliberately counted over its contents 
 she had plenty of money. With hands that neither trembled 
 nor faltered she tied on her bonnet and put on her cloak. 
 She heard her husband on the front gallery talking to the 
 coachman. She heard the horses champing their bits and 
 pawing the ground, and remembered that they were waiting 
 for her. Silently, quietly and unseen she passed out from 
 the rear of the house and went to the stable. No one was 
 there. She wheeled out a light wagon and with her own 
 hands harnessed a horse to it. Then by back roads^ and 
 unfrequented ways she drove to the station. She tied 
 horse and left him there. She bought her ticket, paid for 
 her compartment, and took her place, and soon behind the 
 puffing, snorting engine the train of cars rolled towards 
 the north. Night came, but she could not sleep. 
 clouds of smoke, blacker than the darkaess, seemed, as they 
 flew past the car windows, to be demons; the sparks that 
 came whirling by were devils' eyes mocking and glaring at 
 her. She had but one wish to reach Pomfret and save i 
 fame of an honest man.
 
 144 THE POMFRET MTSTEEY. 
 
 Three days afterwards a dusty, travel-soiled woman alighted 
 at Pomfret station. Changed as she was, who could recog- 
 nize in the pale, haggard, gray-haired, veiled woman the once 
 beautiful Ethel Leslie. She wended her way to the house 
 of the presiding Judge; she rang the door bell and was 
 ushered into his library. He was not there and she sat 
 down to wait for him. Soon he entered. She lifted her 
 veil and confronted him. 
 
 He looked at her for one moment as if in doubt of her 
 identity, then he exclaimed: 
 
 " Mrs. Vance ! " 
 
 " Yes ! I am Mrs. Vance." 
 
 " I thought you were in Florida ! " 
 
 " Four day ago I was there. In an old newspaper I saw 
 an account of Benny Moore's trial and I came north. Tell 
 me about that trial." 
 
 "You are not strong enough, Mrs. Vance. You are 
 weak and fatigued after your journey." 
 
 " Tell me," she said, impatiently," tell me about the trial. 
 I must, I will know." 
 
 So the old Judge told her all. The darkness fell and the 
 room grew dim and yet the white-faced woman sat silent 
 before him with clenched hands, and eyes that stared at 
 him as if they would search out the very secrets of his soul. 
 Once or twice he thought she was dead, she was so still; 
 but yet she bade him go on; to tell her all. 
 
 Then when he was done she rose to her full height before 
 him. 
 
 " Listen to what I say," she said; " I shall not tell you 
 a dream. What was supposed, was right. Through the 
 glass transom I saw thefj-obber, but it was not Benny Moore. 
 Take me to where I can swear to that and let an innocent 
 man go free." 
 
 The old judge sprang to his feet.
 
 DETECTIVE WOKK:. 145 
 
 " You did see the robber," he said; " and it was not 
 Benny Moore ! Who was it then? 
 
 " Alas ! " she answered covering her eyes with her hands 
 as if to hide some fearful sight and bending her head as if 
 in shame; " Alas ! That I may not tell." 
 
 " This must be looked into," said the Judge. " But now 
 you are weak and tired. "Will you go home ? " 
 
 " Yes," she said, wearily. " I will go home, home to my 
 father's house. Go you first and prepare them for my com- 
 ing, and I will follow." 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 DETECTIVE WORK. 
 
 BUT what had the detectives been doing all this while ? 
 Had Price been idle ? No. But for a long time his searches 
 had been barren of all results. He had gone to Boston to 
 follow the clue which he had obtained at the railroad station. 
 But though he made a thorough search among the hotels, 
 boarding-houses and amid the hackmen, he could not get 
 upon his track and he had gone back to New York baffled 
 and discouraged. 
 
 There he sought to discover traces of the negotiation 
 of some of the stolen securities. But for a long time he 
 could find no traces, no sign, of any attempt to negotiate 
 them. At length, however, he determined to make the 
 round of all the bankers and brokers' offices in New York 
 to go as an investor seeking for information about certain 
 securities. 
 
 He took the list which Captain Delaney had given to 
 him, and sought out those securities which were not listed 
 on the Stock Exchange, believing that they were more likely
 
 146 THE POMFKET ilYSTEKY. 
 
 to be remembered than stocks and bonds which, were dealt 
 in every day. He committed these to memory and then 
 strolled among the brokers' offices asking about them. 
 
 For a long while he could get no satisfactory reply, but 
 one day he strolled into the office of Merrihew & Williams, 
 and found there a clerk who had a faint remembrance of 
 having once entered upon the books a sale of some Massachu- 
 setts Railroad bonds. Still the clerk was not sure; he might 
 have seen the name of the railroad when looking up other 
 securities; but the name had a familiar sound and he was 
 quite sure that he had seen the name before. Price suc- 
 ceeded in interesting him sufficiently to induce him to 
 promise to look over the books. For a day or two Price 
 did not go back to that office, but spent his time in making 
 inquiries of other brokers. One or two did remember that 
 the bonds he mentioned were among the list of those stolen 
 from the Pomfret Bank and notified the police of his in- 
 quiries with what result may be imagined. 
 
 When Price did go back to Merrihew & Williams, the 
 clerk, who was thorough-going young fellow, had looked up 
 the sale and found its entry. At Price's request he showed 
 him the entry fifty bonds, due 1910, 7 per cent., $1000, 
 each, sold on account of C. Van Duzer to Johnson & Iddings. 
 
 Fifty bonds the same number as were stolen from the 
 bank the numbers not given. Price knew that he had two 
 things to do first, to find out the numbers of the bonds 
 stolen; that was easy, he had only to write to Pomfret; 
 second, to find out the numbers of the bonds sold, that was 
 not so easy; and thirdly, and most difficult of all, to discover 
 the seller, " C. Van Duzer." 
 
 Price could find no one to tell him what C. Van Duzer 
 looked like. He was a chance customer. There were so 
 many of those coming and going that the clerks could not 
 tell whether this particular one was short or tall, stout or
 
 DETECTIVE WOKK. 147 
 
 thin, bearded or clean shaven. It was not much of a clue, 
 perhaps no clue at all, for the date of the sale was previous 
 to the robbery of the bank, but Price determined that, even 
 if it was only a coincidence, that this amount of bonds 
 rarely dealt in should be sold and stolen, he would follow 
 the matter up, until he at least discovered the serial num- 
 bers of the bonds sold and the bonds stolen. If these num- 
 bers were different then his labor would be wasted, but in 
 all his experience he had never neglected trifles, and often 
 had they led him to success. 
 
 So he sought out the firm who had bought them, and 
 learned from them that they had sold them to an insurance 
 company at Hartford. 
 
 Price took the train to Hartford and saw those bonds. 
 Their numbers were the same as those stolen from the bank. 
 Here was a mystery. The " trifle," had led to a mystery 
 for how could bonds be stolen from a bank in Pomfret at a 
 time when they were securely locked up in the vaults of an 
 insurance company in Hartford ? He became more anxious 
 to find " 0. Van Duzer." 
 
 He went back to New York to Merrihew & Williams and 
 frankly told them his whole case. They were interested. 
 In most men the hunter instinct is strong an inheritance 
 from the old days when the ancestors of mankind were 
 savages they feel a fierce delight in tracking their prey, 
 whether it be man or beast. And when Price told that 
 firm of stock-brokers that he had never ceased to believe 
 that the thieves had an accomplice among the employees of 
 the bank Merrihew himself volunteered to go with Price to 
 Pomfret to see if he could recognize their quondam customer 
 among the Pomfret people. So much interested was he that 
 he even shaved off the beard that he had worn for the last 
 twenty years that he might not be recognized. 
 
 They did not go to Pomfret. While they were in the
 
 148 THE POMFBE MYSTEEY. 
 
 train on their way there a man got into their car at Hartford, 
 and the broker, plucking Price by the sleeve, whispered, 
 " That's the man !" 
 
 " I know him," said Price, " it is Ephraim Chester the 
 cashier of the bank." 
 
 " It is the same man," whispered the broker excitedly, 
 " much grayer than when he came to us, but I would swear 
 to him anywhere." 
 
 There were not many people in the car, and Price, rising, 
 went over and touched the cashier on the shoulder. The 
 cashier looked up. 
 
 " Mr. Chester, I believe ? " said Price. 
 
 " That is my name, sir," said the cashier. 
 
 "You do not know me," continued Price; "I met you 
 in Pomfret, I was visiting at the Moores when the bank was 
 robbed. My name is Price." 
 
 " Ah, Mr. Price," responded the cashier, " I must beg 
 your pardon. I had forgotten, but I remember you now. 
 Will you not be seated ? " 
 
 Price took the proffered seat, and then remarked, " I am 
 going to Pomfret to look up a man named C. Van Duzer. 
 Do you happen to know any one there of that name ? " 
 
 The cashier started and grew pale. He tried to speak, 
 but his throat was suddenly parched and his tongue seemed 
 to be paralyzed. Price watched him and his manner 
 changed, and he said sternly, though low, so that others 
 could not hear. 
 
 " You will consider yourself my prisoner, Mr. Chester, I 
 am a detective." 
 
 Still the cashier said nothing, and Price continued; 
 
 " I am not alone. I have a friend here. Let me suggest 
 that you leave the train with us at Willimantic. You may, 
 perhaps, save yourself from State's prison by confessing and 
 We will be less noticed there than in Pomfret."
 
 14.Q 
 
 DETECTIVE WORK. 
 
 The cashier muttered a hoarse consent, and all three got 
 off the train at Willimantic. 
 
 Now sir " said Price to Chester, when they had been 
 shown to their room at the hotel, "you will tell us abont 
 the robbery of the bank. First let me say to you however, 
 that you did wisely to make no disturbance on the tram. 
 You could not have escaped from me, and you would only 
 have given public notoriety to your arrest. I have no 
 desire/' Price continued, "to inflict any punishment on 
 vou but I desire to acquit Mr. Moore and convict Arthur 
 Vance. He robbed the bank and you gave him the com- 
 bination of the safe." 
 
 " Yes," murmured the cashier. 
 
 "You had perviously sold some of the securities of the 
 
 bank." 
 
 " Do you know that, too ? " 
 
 The broker here stepped forward. "Mr. Van Duzer 
 he said, " perhaps you may not recognize me with my beard 
 shaved off, but I am John Merrihew." 
 
 The cashier looked from one to the other with white, 
 pallid face. At last he spoke. " Mr. Merrihew," he said, 
 '' I know you to be an honest man, and what you say may 
 be relied upon. If you will give me your word that I shall 
 go free, I will tell you all that I know " 
 
 "You may give that promise," said Price, "and I will 
 back you up in it. This conversation will not be used 
 against you, Mr. Chester, and if others would disclose your 
 guilt they must discover it for themselves. 
 3 Then I will tell you all," answered the cashier, and 
 shall be glad to confess it, for it has been a heavy burden 
 upon my soul and I have sometimes felt that it would drive 
 
 ^"Tfew nights before the robbery, Vance came to me 
 and asked me to take a walk with him. It was about eight
 
 150 THE POMFKET MTSTEEY. 
 
 o'clock in the evening when we left my house and walked 
 up the highway through the town. The incidents of that 
 night are burned into my brain. I have dreamed them 
 over many a time, and waked to a horrible dread that in my 
 sleep I had told them aloud. I can never forget them. 
 The whole scene, the very words he used, the very way he 
 looked, are stamped indelibly in my memory. We walked 
 on until the open fields lay on either side of us and the town 
 far behind. 
 
 " It was a calm, still Spring night. One of those warm, 
 almost oppressively warm, nights that come sometimes to- 
 ward the close of March. The stars shone bright in the 
 dark, clear, blue sky; there was no moon nor cloud to dim 
 their glory. I remember that the air was very still; that 
 the insect world had not yet awakened from its winter sleep, 
 and only the cry of the night hawk, the hooting of an owl, 
 or the distant barking of a watch dog, broke the silence. 
 
 " At last I stopped and jokingly said, ' This road leads 
 to Hartford, as I suppose you know, Mr. Vance. Do you 
 mean to walk me there ? ' 
 
 " Vance also stopped and faced me. * I might as well do 
 so/ he said; ' there is a State's prison at Hartford.' 
 
 " ' What do you mean?' I asked, and even in the dim 
 starlight Vance could see that I trembled. 
 
 " ' There are fifty thousand dollars of Massachusetts Rail- 
 road bonds on the books of the bank and not in the safe/ 
 said he. 
 
 " ' You are wrong/ I answered eagerly; ' they are in the 
 upper left hand corner, wrapped in brown paper and sealed 
 and indorsed.' 
 
 " ' The seals and the indorsment are there, but the pack- 
 age contains only brown paper.' 
 
 " ' Great God ! The bank has been robbed ! ' I cried, 
 
 fi 'As you say.'
 
 DETECTIVE WOKK. 151 
 
 " ' Have you told the Squire ? ' 
 " ' No one knows it but you and I.' 
 " ' Who could have taken them?' 
 
 " ' Perhaps Wall Street brokers could give yon some in- 
 formation/ 
 
 "'My God ! ' said I, sinking helplessly down upon a stone 
 by the road side, ' you know all, then.' 
 
 " ' I have learnt to remember faces/ he answered. ' I saw 
 you in Wall Street, and 1 know that you speculated, and 
 lost, that you took those bonds to make good your margins, 
 and that the entries on the books have been falsified ever 
 since/ 
 
 " ' My God ! What will you do ? ' 
 
 " ' Save you man ! D n you, brace up. Don't trem- 
 ble like that, and stop your teeth chattering. You make 
 me shiver.' 
 " 'Save me?' 
 " 'Yes, save you.' 
 " 'How?' 
 
 " 'Can't you guess?' 
 " 'No!' 
 
 " Vance bent down and whispered, ' Let the bank be 
 robbed.' 
 
 " ' What ! ' said I, starting, ' No ! No ! ' 
 " ' I tell you, yes. That is the only way you can be 
 saved. There will be an examination of the securities be- 
 fore long. You will be found out. And you know the 
 penalty as well as I do.' 
 
 " ' Twenty years at hard labor ! ' 
 " ' I believe that's it.' 
 " ' But the bonds will show in the books?' 
 " ' Of course. So much the better for you.' 
 ' '' Again Vance bent down and whispered to me. He 
 told me that I had only to leave the combination of the safe
 
 152 THE POMFKET MYSTEKY. 
 
 where it could be found. That then friends of his would 
 do the rest, and he promised me ten thousand dollars if 
 the scheme worked. 
 
 " 'I will not do it/ said I aloud. ' As you say, I am a 
 ruined man. I will not plunge deeper in crime. I will 
 tell all to-morrow. I will tell how you have tempted 
 me.' 
 
 " ' You refuse, then?' 
 
 " ' Yes, I refuse. I have been bad enough. I will con- 
 fess my crime and take my punishment.' 
 
 " ' Twenty years at hard labor? ' 
 
 " ' Better that than a heavier punishment for a crime such 
 as you propose.' 
 
 " 'So you refuse ?' 
 
 " M do. I will make a clean breast of it to-morrow.' 
 
 " 'And accuse me?' 
 
 " 'And accuse you.' 
 
 " 'And who will believe you ? What reason could I have 
 for such an action ? Your crime will be proved and your 
 accusation against me will be taken as simple spite for my 
 discovery.' 
 
 " ' Nevertheless I will tell all.' 
 
 " ' Your wife and sister are well provided for, then?' 
 
 " ' Oh, God, they have not one cent except my salary.' 
 
 " ' You will continue to support them from your earn- 
 ings in State's prison, I suppose ? ' 
 
 " ' My God ! my God ! ' 
 
 " ' It will be a pleasant thing for you to stand in the 
 felon's dock in Pomfret Court House. The mills will un- 
 doubtedly give their hands a holiday to see the show ! ' 
 
 ' "My God! my God!' 
 
 ' " Your wife will be pleased to be told of your little mis- 
 fortune, I suppose ? ' 
 
 " 'Oh, my God!'
 
 DETECTIVE "WORK. 153 
 
 " ' At what hour shall I tell Squire Leslie that you wish 
 to speak to him ? ' 
 
 " ' I am in your power !' I exclaimed, despairingly. 
 
 " ' Yes, I should think you were/ 
 
 " ' But what if I am discovered?' I asked. 
 
 " Tool! Coward!' exclaimed he, 'you never will be. 
 You will be away, or at home, or sick under the Doctor's 
 care, anywhere you like. Here, drink this,' and he handed 
 me his brandy flask. 
 
 " I took a long drink and then we two walked back to 
 tne village. 
 
 " 'You will be silent?' said Yance as we reached my 
 house. 
 
 " ' As the grave/ 
 
 " ' Good night/ 
 
 " 'Goodnight/ 
 
 " Only a few day after that it was on a Monday he 
 came again to me and bade me place the combination of 
 the safe next Wednesday night in a drawer that he pointed 
 out. He himself left for Chicago that evening. 
 
 " When Wednesday came I did as he had told me, for I 
 dared not refuse. I placed a memorandum of the combina- 
 tion where he had directed me, and I gave a false com- 
 bination to the Squire. I went home and pleading illness 
 sent for the doctor. And I was ill. The doctor came and, 
 as you know, gave me something to make me sleep all 
 night, and when I waked next morning I heard that the 
 bank was robbed. 
 
 " Since then my life has been a hell to me. Were it not 
 for my wife and sister I should say, ' Do what you will with 
 me,' but for their sakesl must live." 
 
 Price looked at the pale, cringing form of the cashier, 
 with contempt. 
 
 " We have given you our promise/' he said, " What you
 
 154 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 have told us will not be used until your safety has been 
 provided for." 
 
 But when Price got to Pomfret, Ethel had made her con- 
 fession and Benny Moore was free. 
 
 What was left to the detective but to search out Arthur 
 Vance ! And Price swore a great oath that he would never 
 rest till he had found him. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 POUND AND LOST. 
 
 BUT Arthur "Vance, where was he ? He had left the little 
 Florida cottage and gone no one knew whither. 
 
 When his wife had not come down for the drive, he had 
 gone up stairs to see what detained her and found her ab- 
 sent. The crumpled newspaper on the floor told its own 
 story. But where had she gone ? Had the shock of her 
 discovery again unsettled her mind or had she fled north- 
 ward to right the foul wrong done Benny Moore. 
 
 The alarmed servants searched the house and grounds and 
 found the horse and wagon gone, and Vance, when this was 
 reported to him, hastened to the station; there was the miss- 
 ing vehicle and Ethel had departed northward on the train. 
 What should he do? 
 
 When he had escaped with his booty and had found him- 
 self freed from all fear of punishment for the theft, his 
 dreams of wealth were fully satisfied, and he had looked 
 forward to a pleasant life of ease, spent with his wife in 
 traveling through new and foreign countries. But now 
 that she had gone to denounce him, those hopes were at an 
 end. He could not realize, he did not for a moment think, 
 that she would refuse to criminate him. He knew that the
 
 FOUND AND LOST. 155 
 
 great wrong he had done was past all hope of man's pardon. 
 Flight was all that was left for him. Once more he must 
 put his past life away and begin a new one. 
 
 When, after the failure of the bank, the Squire's lands 
 and houses had been sold Vance had bought them and 
 deeded them to his wife. He would let them all go as some 
 small atonement for the wrong he had done her. He had 
 still much/ money, many stocks and bonds, hid away in a 
 secure hiding place in New York; he would get them and 
 leave the country and make a fresh life for himself where 
 men knew not, and cared not to know, his history. 
 
 So to New York he went, and following swiftly upon his 
 
 trail like blood hounds were the detectives. 
 
 * * * * * # 
 
 " I have come for the goods I left with you." 
 " You shall have them all in fifteen minutes. " 
 The speakers were two men. One was of a bright and 
 fair complexion, with red hair and a large red beard. A 
 man of medium height, neatly and compactly built. He 
 wore a rough slouch hat, pulled low over his brows. A 
 coarse flannel shirt and rough pea-jacket and trousers of 
 rough blue cloth. The other was a little, thin, weazened, 
 dried-up fellow, with a Jewish cast of countenance. He was 
 neatly but plainly dressed. His gray hair had been recently 
 cut. His gray mustache was neatly trimmed. He looked 
 like some quiet clerk or small tradesman with a safe con- 
 servative business. Nothing about him showed his real 
 calling. 
 
 The house in which they were was on the corner, and the 
 room where the conversation took place was high up under 
 the eaves. 
 
 The Jew raised a trap door in the floor disclosing a narrow 
 and deep hole, down which a rope ladder hung. Grasping 
 it in his hands he swung himself down, and with the agility
 
 156 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 of a cat disappeared in the darkness. The sailor waited for 
 him. Soon the Jew reappeared, a bundle slung over his 
 shoulder, with the ends grasped in his teeth. He had used 
 both hands to climb with, and as he put the bundle down, 
 he panted from his exertions. 
 
 The sailor took up the bundle and placed it on a rickety 
 pine table that stood near: 
 
 " IB it all right? " he asked. 
 
 " Oh, my dear Captain. Would I go back on such a good 
 customer as you ? " 
 
 " You'd go back on any one if you could make money by 
 it." 
 
 " Not on you, Captain. Have not I always rendered to 
 you just and true accounts for every penny's worth that you 
 have ever left here ? " 
 
 " Well, yes, I must confess you have." 
 
 The sailor sat himself down, and untying the ends of the 
 bundle disclosed a heap of bonds and stocks and promissory 
 notes. 
 
 " No," continued the Jew, while his companion was thus 
 engaged. "No, Captain. Count them; you will find them 
 right. Ah ! " he continued, rubbing his hands, " this is the 
 business that I like. No risk, no exposure, and good pay. 
 Count them, Captain, count them." 
 
 "These State bonds," said the other, sorting them out 
 as he spoke, " these State bonds you must buy from me at 
 half their price." 
 
 " Indeed, Captain, I have not the money." 
 
 "You must get it then. By to-morrow noon I must 
 leave here. I want exchange on London." 
 
 " Well, if you say so, I suppose I must," said the Jew, 
 with a sigh; " but it is a large sum." 
 
 " These notes," continued the sailor, "you may keep for 
 what they are worth,"
 
 POUND AND LOST. 157 
 
 " And that is not much," said the Jew, with a leer; " it 
 would be safer to burn them." 
 
 " Burn them, then, if you want." 
 
 "No. I will not do that. I have some good friends 
 who will give me a few dollars for them." 
 
 " These stocks; what shall I do with them?" 
 
 " They are bad things. Why not take them abroad with 
 you?" 
 
 " Because I do not want the bother. And these railroad 
 bonds what shall I do with them ? " 
 
 " If you will not take them with you, what shall I say?" 
 
 " You must sell them as best you can. Half of what you 
 get is yours; half you will remit to me, you know where in 
 Paris." 
 
 " You will wish me to collect the rents of your houses 
 while you are away ? " 
 
 " Yes. The old powers of attorney will do, I suppose ? " 
 
 " Yes; they will do." 
 
 " And mind, if you have a chance to sell any of them you 
 will do so, and send me the money to Paris." 
 
 "Yes; I will do so." 
 
 " And here," said the sailor, drawing a roll of bills from 
 an inner pocket of his coat, "here is the payment agreed 
 upon." 
 
 He dropped the roll of bills on the table hastily, and 
 turned toward the door. The Jew was already there listen- 
 ing noiselessly. 
 
 There was a sound as if stealthy footsteps were climbing 
 up the steep stairs. Perhaps they were only tramps. 
 
 The two men listened. The steps halted and the handle 
 of the door was stealthily tried. But the door was firmly 
 bolted. The two men stood silent. There was a sound 
 of subdued whispering outside, then came a rap at the 
 door.
 
 158 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 No answer. A louder rap. Still no answer. Then the 
 door was shaken violently and a heavy object was thrown 
 violently against it, but the strong iron bolts still held. 
 
 The Jew came softly to the side of his companion and 
 whispered in his ear. 
 
 " It is the police ! Quick, the roof; " he pointed to a scuttle 
 door that was above them, " it is not fastened. Over the 
 roofs to the corner house; there is the tunnel; quick ! " 
 
 There was no time to delay. The sailor sprang up the 
 ladder and threw the scuttle open and fled over the roofs. 
 The Jew gave one glance after him. 
 
 " Fool," he muttered, " he has left the scuttle open." 
 
 With one catlike bound he was at the side of the table. 
 He seized the roll of bills and the State bonds and dropped 
 them down the opening. Then with one spring he jumped 
 down upon the rope ladder. 
 
 He was none too soon. The trap door fell just as the 
 bolts and bars yielded, and Price and two other men were 
 precipitated into the room. It was empty; but the securi- 
 ties scattered about and the open scuttle told the tale. 
 
 " Johnson stay here. Wilson follow me," shouted Price 
 as he sprung up the ladder to the roof. 
 
 Five houses off they saw the man they were pursuing. 
 Their only hope now was that the scuttles would be closed. 
 Vain hope ! The man stooped and lifted the furthest one. 
 Quick as a flash Price drew a pistol and fired as the sailor 
 disappeared down the scuttle. 
 
 " Quick," cried Price, as he looked down and saw that 
 the man had still continued his flight; and he swung him- 
 self down through the opening. 
 
 Still the stranger hurried downward. His right arm hung 
 useless by his side. He felt the warm blood trickle from 
 his shoulder, where the bullet had struck him. His shirt 
 grew wet and clung to him. He glanced back and saw red
 
 A CONFESSION. 159 
 
 stains on the wooden stairs. He heard the heavy footsteps 
 of the detectives as they followed him. 
 
 He reached the cellar at last. There was an empty hogs- 
 head on its side with the head out. He plunged into it and 
 crawled onward. It was the mouth of the tunnel that led 
 under the street to the house opposite. Once there, and 
 the detective baffled, there were other means of escape. He 
 paused to regain his breath and listened. There were voices 
 behind him, but not in the tunnel. He was safe. 
 
 He listened again and he heard a voice, that he knew 
 was that of Price, exclaim: 
 
 "Arthur Vance," it said, "you have escaped me once 
 again, but I swear that I will have you yet." 
 
 CHAPTEE XXI. 
 
 A CONFESSION. 
 
 BENNY MOORE, a free man once more, returned to New 
 York. The experience which he had undergone had 
 robbed him of all light-heartedness, and though he was not 
 yet forty years of age his misfortunes had streaked his hair 
 and beard with silver and saddened his life, so that now he 
 seldom smiled. 
 
 Into the lives of most men there comes some great calam- 
 ity which marks the boundary between old age and the 
 years before it. "So it was with Benny. Though all the 
 joys that the world knows might be hereafter heaped upon 
 him though he might live to be a hundred years of age 
 though second childhood might come to him, yet he could 
 never be the same as he was before the tragedy at Pomfret. 
 Though memory itself should die the old spirit would not 
 return to him.
 
 160 THE fOMFRET MYSTEKY. 
 
 It is always sad to see a man old before his time sad to 
 think of the tragedy which has made him old but the 
 spectacle is sadder yet when he is aged through no fault of 
 his most sad when the vindictiveness or unscrupulousness 
 of another has brought about the change. 
 
 In vain Benny threw himself heartily into his work: the 
 memory of his imprisonment hung like a cloud about him, 
 making him heartsick and weary. If he could only have 
 yielded to the promptings and yearnings of his heart he 
 would have gone to some desert place and hid himself from 
 the sight of all mankind. 
 
 He sat one evening in his office in Nassau Street. He 
 had come down late from court, and wearied by his forensic 
 efforts, had thrown himself into a chair, and sat moodily 
 gazing into the fire The afternoon's mail lay unopened on 
 his desk, and papers relating to business of the morrow were 
 scattered about. He did not feel equal to the task of read- 
 ing them. 
 
 His mind was busy with the memory of the years gone 
 by. He thought he was a boy again, with all his boyish 
 hopes, ambitions and fears surging in his breast. He lived 
 again the pleasant years of his life. Ethel Leslie, as she 
 was then, sat by his side as he drove his fleet horse over the 
 country roads. The well-remembered landscapes were pic- 
 tured to his mind, and then, like the shifting of a scene upon 
 the stage, the memory of the tragedy whose shadow had 
 fallen so heavily and grimly upon him came like a sudden 
 flight of darkness, shrouding the bright scenes of memory 
 in a thick gloom. 
 
 The hum of the busy world outside at last roused him 
 from his dreams and they fled away. He sighed wearily, 
 and with an effort turned to his desk. One letter lay there 
 in a strange handwriting. He picked it up and idly glanced 
 at its superscription, and it seemed as if he had scarcely
 
 A CONFESSION. 161 
 
 energy enough to open and read it. He was about to lay it 
 down when the foolishness of thus yielding to bitter memor- 
 ies flashed across his mind, and he tore the envelope open 
 and unfolded the paper that it contained. The writing was 
 unfamiliar to him and the paper itself bore the heading of 
 Sing Sing prison. It was not long, a glance or two sufficed 
 to put him in the knowledge of its contents, which were as 
 follows: 
 
 " SIR : 
 
 " James Mulvany alias Red Dick lies now sick unto 
 death, in the Hospital of this prison. He prays you to come 
 to him as he has something to confess to you. I know not 
 wliat it is but that you will come is his request. 
 
 11 He has not many days to live, and if you decide to come, 
 you must do so quickly if you would see Mm alive, 
 "lam, sir, 
 
 " Very respectfully, 
 
 "THOMAS GRIFFITH, 
 
 "Chaplain." 
 
 Benny thought over the name. Some one of his old 
 clients, he thought; and yet the name was not familiar to 
 him, and somehow his memory failed to recall it. Lighting 
 the gas, for the afternoon had waned and the gray twilight 
 of the winter day was deepening into the gloom of night, he 
 took down his old ledger and ran his eye down the index 
 pages searching for the name. It was not there. Still he 
 might have borne some other alias when Benny defended 
 him. 
 
 " Still/' thought Benny, "to-morrow I need not be in 
 court and I will take a run up to Sing Sing and hear what 
 he has to say." 
 
 So on the morrow the Central train bore Benny Moore, 
 6
 
 162 THE POilFKET MYSTE&Y. 
 
 well wrapped up and defended from the cold, past the icy 
 shores and snow-clad banks of the Hudson, up to that little 
 town which has gained such notoriety as the locality of the 
 State's prison. 
 
 Leaving the train and jumping into a sleigh Benny was 
 soon gliding up the steep hill-side road that led from the 
 river. He drove to the long row of gray-stone buildings and 
 brick sheds, and showing his letter, was ushered into the 
 presence of the chaplain, and in a few minutes stood by the 
 bedside of the dying criminal. 
 
 " At last! " the sick man said; " I have prayed that you 
 might come, and at last you are here. Send the rest away, 
 what I have to tell is for your ear alone." 
 
 " If you have any confession to make," Benny rejoined, 
 " it would be better if there were other witnesses besides 
 myself present." 
 
 " No! " exclaimed the convict. " Do you think I mean to 
 'peach' upon my pals? I would sooner die first." 
 
 "I think that we had better grant his request," Benny 
 said, and so the chaplain and the nurse retired; but ere 
 they left the nurse placed a cordial by the bedside, and 
 said: 
 
 " If he grows weak, a teaspoonful of this will revive him." 
 
 " Come near to me," said the sick man, " for I am weak 
 and my voice is faint and I have much to tell you." 
 
 Benny did as reqiiested, and the convict continued: 
 
 " I was one of those," he said, " who robbed the Pomfret 
 Bank. There were several in the gang, and our chief ar- 
 ranged our several duties for us. He and I alone were to 
 enter the safe; the others were to keep watch outside and 
 to aid us in our flight. 
 
 " In pursuance of our plan we came to Pomfret about a 
 week before the robbery, and in the disguise of Avorkmen on 
 the railroad we learned the different roads and avenues of
 
 A CONFESSION". 163 
 
 escape. On the Sundays that we were there we roamed 
 over the country and made ourselves acquainted with the 
 habits of the townsfolk. 
 
 " There was a woman in our gang, and she was to come 
 to Pomfret and aid in carrying off the plunder. 
 
 " Three nights before the robbery I stole out into the 
 woods that the townsfolk call their Park. I had been a coun- 
 try-lad in the old country, before I came over here, and 
 many (times had poached in the woods and streams about 
 my father's home. I knew that there were rabbits in the 
 Park at Pomfret and fish in the river, and a longing came 
 over me to do as I had done in my youthful days, and so I 
 stole quietly forth, as I was wont to do in the old country. 
 
 " I had set my snares in the river, and was fixing my 
 traps on the land, when I heard voices approaching, and I 
 shrunk quietly back among the bushes. The speakers were 
 talking in low subdued tones and had approached near to 
 me before I heard them. They passed within scarce a dozen 
 feet from my hiding-place, and I recognized the voices of 
 our chief and a woman of our gang, who was supposed to 
 be in New York. They passed by me and I stole noiselessly 
 after them until they seated themselves upon a fallen log. 
 I flung myself upon my belly, and crawled quietly until I 
 was so close that I could almost have heard their slightest 
 whisper. 
 
 " ' And now, Adele/ I heard che chief say, ' what brings 
 you here at this time, when you know the business on which 
 we are engaged, and how necessary that we should remain 
 unknown ? ' 
 
 " ' I know it all/ she answered, ' and you need not be 
 alarmed; no one has seen me here, no one will see me leave 
 here. But oh, Arthur, my heart misgives me. I have 
 dreamed of you during the past nights. I saw you chased 
 by furious animals, they tore along your tracks as you sped
 
 164 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 swiftly before them. You were very pale and your breath 
 came in gasps, and they gained on you inch by inch, foot by 
 foot, until they seemed about to spring upon you. 7 
 
 " The chief threw back his head and I heaid the sound 
 of low laughter as the woman continued: 
 
 " ' Laugh not/ she said, t for I dreamed again, and saw 
 you all alone with thick darkness about you. You seemed 
 chained to the ground, and I heard your moans, as if you 
 were in agony. Suddenly the darkness lifted, and then I 
 saw that you were smeared with blood. Your face had 
 streaks of crimson over it, your hair was matted with clots 
 of curdled gore, and from your hands, as you moved them 
 to and fro, drops of blood fell. 
 
 " ' Again I dreamed, and I saw a dim, shadowy figure 
 wringing its hands as if in woeful grief, and I heard a voice 
 which cried imploringly, " Save him! Save him! " And then 
 I knew that the figure was Ethel Leslie, and the voice was 
 her voice. These dreams portend disaster, perhaps death, 
 death to you, and I have hurried here to beg you to defer 
 your action until some more auspicious time.' 
 
 " ' Heard any man ever so foolish a request?' muttered 
 our chief. 
 
 " ' Do not say no! ' implored the woman. ' I have been a 
 faithful servant to you ! I have done your bidding in every- 
 thing. I have nursed you in sickness. I have been gay 
 with you when prosperity shone upon you. I have been 
 sad when you would be sad. And now, I implore you grant 
 me this one request.' And I could see that she knelt to 
 him. 
 
 " * It is enough,' the chief said, rising, ' you have told me 
 what you have done for me; shall I remind you what / have 
 done for you f Have you forgotten that I found you one 
 bitter winter's night, a ragged match girl, half frozen at the 
 entrance of a church. Must I narrate to you how I clothed
 
 A COXFESSIOX. 165 
 
 and fed you, how you were educated, and must I recount 
 the luxuries that I have given you since then ? And now, 
 forgetting all these, you come to me with your idle super- 
 stitions and your foolish dreams to balk me just as I see 
 success within my grasp ! ' 
 
 "'I forget nothing/ the woman answered, ' I remember 
 all those things. And by the memory of them I pray you 
 do not proceed with what you have to do. If not for my 
 sake, then for the sake of Ethel Leslie.' 
 
 " The chief had been pacing up and down while she was 
 speaking; now he turned suddenly towards her and savagely 
 asked, ' What in the fiend's name has caused you to plead 
 for her f ' 
 
 " ' She was kind to me,' the woman said, ' when I first 
 came to Pomfret. And, though my illness was brought on 
 by myself in pursuance of the plan that you bade me adopt, 
 she nursed me tenderly. So when I thought how she would 
 be doomed to poverty and woe, my heart bled for her and I 
 determined that it should not be! ' 
 
 " She spoke these words with strong resolution and she 
 continued, ' Therefore, if you refuse my prayer, I warn you 
 that I will send a warning vague so that no suspicion will 
 rest on you but yet a warning which will prevent your 
 scheme from being carried out.' 
 
 " They were facing each other now, and her words came 
 boldly, in swift succession, yet never loudly. 
 
 " Quick as a flash I saw the chief draw back and in an 
 instant he struck her a terrific blow upon the forehead. 
 She dropped like a stone without a groan. He stooped 
 over her while I watched him with cold beads of perspira- 
 tion standing upon my forehead. 
 
 " Then I saw him tie stones to the body and cast it into 
 the water. And then when he was gone I stole back trem- 
 bling to my lodging place. There was no struggle; the
 
 166 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 place where they had stood was trampled down, and I had 
 left tracks where I had crawled up behind them. 
 
 " To make my story short, for I feel that my strength is 
 ebbing fast, we robbed the bank that Wednesday night. You 
 had been seen in town that day, and the chief, to fix the 
 crime on you, buried the notes upon your father's farm. 
 
 " I could not die with the knowledge of these crimes 
 locked in my breast alone and so I sent for you/' 
 
 " One question more," said Benny. " You spoke of the 
 Chief what was his name ? " 
 
 "We knew him only as the ' Chief/" gasped the dying 
 man, " but in Pomfret they called him Vance." 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE RED FARM-HOUSE. 
 
 ON~CE more the scene shifts to the low, broad farmhouse, 
 painted red, which lies among the hills in the heart of Ken- 
 tucky. In the open doorway of the kitchen stands the 
 squat figure of an old, gray-headed negro. It is night, 
 but the full moon, high in the heavens, lights up the fertile 
 valley which lies beneath the farmhouse, showing the river 
 which flows there and the white steeples that, rising up- 
 ward, mark where the houses are clustered into villages. 
 A few lights still gleam in the windows of the distant 
 houses, like so many reflections of the stars, and the sounds 
 of the night come with a vague distinctness. 
 
 The light from the kitchen streams out of the open door- 
 way, as if in vain emulation of the moonbeams, and throws 
 the misshapen shadow of the negro almost down to the 
 dusty road that runs in front of the farmhouse. But if 
 Grim Morrow his real name was Grimalkin, early short-
 
 THE KED FARM-HOUSE. 167 - 
 
 ened to Grim takes delight in standing there watching the 
 landscape and his own grotesque, exaggerated shadow, 
 Kezia, the ebony-faced negress within, who calls herself his 
 spouse, evinces no similar pleasure. 
 
 " Come in dar an' shet de do/' she exclaims; " duz ye 
 wan' ter git de rumtiz a stan'in' in de night air ? Sher de 
 
 do'." 
 
 With one last look out into the night Grim obeys his 
 wife's commands, enters and shuts the door, but instead of 
 taking his seat, he reaches down a battered, much-worn 
 coon-skin cap and an old army cloak. 
 
 " You ain't a gwine up t' de cave dis night, is you, Grim ? " 
 Kezia asks. 
 
 " Yes, I is, arter pra'rs," he answers; " but I ain't a gwine 
 to make much exploration, kase I mus' start early in de 
 mawning to meet dem two Norfern ladies dat's a coinm' to 
 stay yere." 
 
 Two or three miles along the road, and not far from the 
 red cottage, is the opening of one of those gigantic caves 
 that undermine the soil of Indiana and Kentucky. Away 
 from the beaten track of travel, but few strangers visit it, and 
 then they travel but few miles from its mouth. But there 
 are miles and miles of passages, stretching under the earth, 
 crossing and recrossing each other at different grades. 
 Streams of water flow there, in leaping cascades as their beds 
 descend, in quiet pools as their course is level, and in these 
 waters are eyeless fish and strange animalculae. The galler- 
 ies and great chambers of this cave are inhabited only by 
 bats and owls, and through all and over all is the blackness 
 and silence of the grave. 
 
 Among all the guides to this cave, Grim Morrow was the 
 best. Even when he was a child the cave exerted a strange, 
 weird fascination over him, and in " de days befo' de wah'" 
 he would spend all his holidays in roaming through its gal-
 
 168 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 lories; and later when he was free he had no care for his 
 freedom, except that it gave him more time to spend in 
 searching out the hidden mysteries of the cavern. 
 
 Of late he has slipped away at night and been gone nearly 
 until daybreak. No one knows of these nightly excursions 
 except Kezia, and she grumbles at them, mostly because 
 when Grim disappears a loaf of bread and what cold meat 
 there is disappears also. Grim, when she taxed him with 
 taking them, did not deny it, but only said that his travels 
 made him hungry. 
 
 " Fool niggah you/' his wife had said to him more than 
 once, " ter go a trampazin frew dem ar dark tunnils when 
 you ought to be in yer wawm bed." 
 
 On the evening of the following day a country- wagon was 
 slowly ascending the road that led from the valley up to the 
 little red farmhouse. The horses had journeyed many miles 
 that day, and were now slowly and wearily toiling up the 
 slope of the hillside road. 
 
 On the front seat of the wagon sat the driver, our negro 
 friend, Grim Morrow; and on the back seat were two 
 women, one sitting erect and straight, attentive to the scenes 
 about her and the conversation of Grim, the other leaning 
 wearily against the padded sides and back of the seat, and 
 casting but languid glances to the points of interest as Grim 
 called attention to them. 
 
 " Yonder," said he, "yonder is the entrance ter de cave 
 dat I was tellin ye about, right up dar by dem hazel 
 bushes, and yere's de parf dat goes up from de road tu de 
 cave. When ye git inter de cave, dar's a great, long tunnil 
 dat grows higher and higher all de time." 
 
 " Wan' ter know ! " ejaculated the elder of the two trav- 
 elers, peering forward as if to get a better look through the 
 gathering twilight at the black spot upon the hillside that
 
 THE RED FAKM-HOUSE. I 69 
 
 marked the entrance to the cavern, while her companion 
 cast a careless glance at it. 
 
 ' < Yes, mum, " continued the loquacious darkey, and dat 
 yere tunnil-passage-way begins ter go down, down, gettin' 
 right smart sort o' steep till' ye comes to a great, big cham- 
 ber-like sort o' place, and then when ye git dar ye can go 
 fur miles an' miles f roo all sorts o' galleries and passage-ways 
 dat lead off from dat chamber." 
 ' ' Du tell ! Is the walkin' good ? " 
 
 " Most ways it is, mum, fur de mos' of de galleries hab 
 got fine, hard san' strowed ober de floor, so dat de walkin's 
 mostly easy." 
 
 " But ain't you likely to lose your way?" 
 " Yes 'urn, 'taint safe to go 'round dar widout a guide. 
 I mos'ly act as de guide fur de folks as wan' tu 'splore de 
 cave, fur I've been over miles an' miles ob it, but I mos' 
 done gone an' got los' dar onct myself." 
 " Sakes alive ! How did that happen ? " 
 " Well, mum, I was on a 'splorin' trip, an' I come tu a 
 gallery dat I hadn't ebber splored, an' I jest thought I'd see 
 where it went tu. So I turned inter it and I went on an' 
 on, what seemed tu me a mighty long ways, an' I had my 
 torch in myhan', an' defust ting I noticed was a foot-print, 
 right in de pafway before me. I was mighty skeered, I tell 
 ye, fur I nebber knowed dat mortal man ebber been in dat 
 part ob de cave befo ! Well, mum, I put my torch down tu 
 de grown' clost, tu de footprints, and I seed dat de man was 
 a gwine down de gallery de same way I was. Den I won- 
 dered how long ago dat man had been dar, fur ye see dat 
 san' will hole' de marks dat ye put in 'em fur ebber and 
 ebber so long, less ye rub 'em out." 
 
 " I wan' ter know ! " said the elder traveler, looking with 
 increased interest at the black spot on the hillside. 
 
 " Fac' fur slmah, mum ! Well, mum, I vent along and
 
 170 THE POMFKET MYSTEKY. 
 
 dar, bymeby, I come tu a place wliar de feller had set down 
 an' lighted his pipe. Dat made me tink dat my pipe was a 
 smoked out, so I sat down dar an' I put de ashes ob my 
 pipe clust by de side o' his'n, an' I lighted my pipe an' went 
 on, fur I wanted tu see whar de footsteps would a lead me 
 tu." 
 
 "Sakes alive!" 
 
 " Fac', mum I went on an' on 'till bymeby I come tu a 
 gallery dat run acrost de one I was on, an' dar I seed, a 
 turnin' out ob dat gallery, de footsteps ob a nudder man. 
 I was 'sprized at that, an' I went 'long kin' o' cautious, fur 
 I thought dat p'raps dose two folks might be doin' suthin 
 dey wouldn't like dis yere niggah a spyin' inter, an' I kep 
 a mighty clus watch out ahead fur de glimmer ob a light. 
 I went along dar an' I begin tu get mighty tired, an' I 
 thought de pafway was a mighty long one, when I cme to 
 de place whar de two men had set down an' lighted dere 
 pipes. Den I was mighty 'sprized, I tell ye, 'till I seed dat 
 de place was jus' like de udder place whar I set down, an' 
 den I seed dat it was de same. Bless ye, missy, I had been 
 a followin' my own footsteps 'round dat ar gallery fur mos' 
 two hours." 
 
 " I wan'ter know ! It must be a skeery place?" 
 
 "Yes, 'um, it is, 'urn. Dar's Massa Morrow's house, up 
 dar, de red house. We'll be dar now 'bout ten minutes. 
 Gee hup." 
 
 If any thing could have roused Ethel for the younger 
 traveler was she, and Aunt Martha was by her side it 
 would have been such a couple as Grimalkin Morrow and his 
 wife. They combined the childish gayety of their race with 
 the simplicity of the plantation darkey, and Ethel, who had 
 never before seen the real Southern negro character, found 
 much to interest her in these two specimens. To Aunt 
 Martha they were a perpetual marvel and study. She was
 
 THE KED FARMHOUSE. 171 
 
 forever wondering at them and at their ways, and no sooner 
 did she begin to think that she understood them than some 
 new freak or oddity would surprise her into wonderment 
 again. 
 
 Mr. Morrow and his wife were at the door to meet the 
 travelers as the dusty wagon and tired horses came to a 
 stop, and Kezia's woolly head, buxom figure and smiling face 
 filled up the door- way behind. They gave a warm welcome 
 to the tired travelers. 
 
 Aunt Martha took to them at once, seeing that they were 
 kind and good, and not likely to oppose their personality 
 to hers, and even Ethel, dead as her heart was, could not 
 but be touched by the chastened sorrow, pity and sweetness 
 of the old woman's face, as she exclaimed, "Poor dear. 
 How tired you look. Kezia, help Grim with the trunks, 
 and you come with me, my dear, and go right to your room. 
 Supper will be ready in a minute, and after a cup of tea and 
 a good night's rest you will be all right." 
 
 Ethel could eat but little, but the drive had given Aunt 
 Martha a vigorous appetite, and she did full justice to the 
 good things on the table. And as she insisted upon know- 
 ing the recipe for each new dish and discussed with old 
 Mrs. Morrow the various methods of cooking certain staple 
 articles, the meal was by no means a silent one. Such a 
 conversation, too, gave a homelike feeling to them all, broke 
 the ice of strangeness in the best possible way, and put them 
 on an amicable footing almost immediately. When, after 
 tea, Aunt Martha, who was supposed to know every kind 
 of knitting stitch, found that the old woman was using a 
 new one, the two were on the best of terms, and were chat- 
 ting with each other in a style that caused old Mr. Morrow 
 to cast many an amused glance at them over his spectacles, 
 and brought a smile the first smile for many months to 
 Ethel's face.
 
 172 THE POMFKET MYSTEKY. 
 
 " They are real nice people," said Aunt Martha, as, having 
 seen Ethel into bed, she kissed her good night and prepared 
 to go into her own adjoining room; " nice good people. Now 
 shut your eyes, dearie/' she added, going softly out and 
 noiselessly closing the door after her. 
 
 The fresh, strange air of the hills brought a sound, peace- 
 ful sleep to Ethel, and not even a dream disturbed her slum- 
 bers. She did not awake until the sun was high in the 
 heavens, and Aunt Martha had been up and dressed long 
 enough to have gone all over the barns, and through the 
 kitchen, pantry and milk room. 
 
 " Wan' ter know," exclaimed that latter personage, as she 
 looked into the bedroom and saw that Ethel's eyes were 
 open. " It's the first real good sleep you've had for a long 
 time. But you'll get well here, that's certain. Why, I 
 feel better, myself," and she suited the action to the word 
 by throwing back her shoulders, and drawing a long, deep 
 breath into her capacioiis lungs. 
 
 For those suffering from troubles of the heart and mind, 
 both rest, occupation and change are necessary, but it is 
 hard to find all of them together. But at the red farmhouse 
 they were all combined. There was the cave to visit, its 
 many natural wonders to see, and its long, dark passages to 
 explore. There were beautiful drives among the hills and 
 through the valleys. There was perpetual amusement in 
 the study of the negro character; and the nights brought 
 long, refreshing sleep. 
 
 Ethel was much interested in old Grim, and he became a 
 devoted slave to her. Indeed, she was a favorite with all 
 in the house, and they grew to like her better and better as 
 the days passed by. 
 
 But Grim became her especial servitor. As she became 
 stronger, he would take her through the winding passages 
 of his beloved cave, and unmurmuringly load himself down
 
 THE RED FARM-HOUSE. 173 
 
 with, the specimens of moss and fragments of stalactites and 
 stalagmites which she picked up or broke off from larger 
 masses. He would climb down into rocky ravines to gather 
 wild flowers if she but chanced to admire their beauty. His 
 own offerings were the simple gifts which nature laid within 
 his reach; a beautiful butterfly, a squirrel caught and tamed 
 by him, a collection of birds' eggs; these, and such as these, 
 the faithful negro laid at his young mistress' feet. There 
 was something in his fidelity like the friendship of a grave, 
 great mastiff. 
 
 The old couple felt enlivened by the presence of new 
 people, and as for Aunt Martha, she had her hands full 
 learning from and teaching Kezia. 
 
 Though there were shady nooks beneath the trees, cool 
 gorges through which mountain streams ran, and easy chairs 
 on the piazza of the farmhouse, Ethel preferred to sit in the 
 darkness and silence of the cave. There, in the passageway 
 near the opening, where the light was a dim twilight and 
 no sound save the rustle and whirr of an owl or bat disturbed 
 the dead quiet, she would sit and think for hours. The 
 dim, gray light of the place where she sat, the black dark- 
 ness beyond, and the night birds flitting to and fro were all 
 in harmony with her own mental condition. So she had a 
 fondness for the dim, shadowy, dismal cave, and spent long 
 hours of reverie there sad and bitter reverie. 
 
 There were passages through her heart which once had 
 been filled with the golden currents of love, but the fires of 
 despair burnt them out and filled the void witli the thick 
 black darkness of misery. And there was a sympathy in 
 the hollow passages of the cave; no flowers blossomed in 
 its darkness; no hopes, no loves, bloomed in her heart. 
 The wild flowers that she plucked outside and carried with 
 her into the cavern grew limp and lifeless, and thus, too, had 
 the joys faded and died under the black shadow that rested
 
 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 upon her life. The bats and the owls were fit companions 
 for her own dark thoughts; and as for the silence was not 
 her own heart stunned ? 
 
 CHAPTEK XXIII. 
 
 DYING. 
 
 ETHEL was sitting thus, one day, upon the rude stone 
 seat within the cave, waiting for Grim, who had promised 
 to show her a chamber where the trickling lime-water had 
 coagulated into great roses, pendent from the roof like gi- 
 gantic flowers growing downwards. But Grim came not, 
 though it was long past the appointed hour, and she was 
 weary of the gray twilight of the cave and the somber 
 shadows of her own thoughts. 
 
 As she sat there she saw the faint glimmer of a distant 
 light. It came nearer until she saw that a man held it, and 
 then it turned aside into a cross passage. Thinking that it 
 was Grim, she rose and walked toward where she had last 
 seen it. 
 
 She knew the path well, there were no pit-falls in the way, 
 no rocks to stumble over, only a straight, narrow passage 
 with a smooth, hard, sandy floor. She went on fearlessly, 
 looking down the side galleries to see if she could spy the 
 light. At last she caught a glimpse of it far down a dim, 
 narrow way only a faint, red speck of fire in the midst of 
 an ocean of blackness. 
 
 She lit her own torch and went carefully through the 
 narrow tunnel. The light grew larger and more distinct 
 as she drew nearer to it, and she went on toward it till she 
 stood in a chamber of considerable magnitude. 
 
 It was an unexplored part of the cave to her she had
 
 DY1KG. 
 
 never been there before but now, in the flickering light of 
 the torches, she saw that the arched roof spread like a dome 
 overhead and was studded with stalactites of strange forms. 
 Eough slabs and tapering spires of stalagmite rose from the 
 yellow sand and broken crystals that carpeted the floor; and 
 half way up, between floor and roof, the wall was broken 
 by a broad terrace that ran around the chamber like the 
 gallery of an amphitheater, while stretching back from it 
 were unexplored and unknown passages. 
 
 Within this chamber, upon a block of broken stalactite, 
 by the side of a pit which yawned, an empty space of dark- 
 ness, in the floor, and from which the sound of rushing water 
 came faintly thundering up, sat a man. His back was to- 
 ward her and his head hung down upon his breast as if he 
 were deep in reverie. It was not Grim. 
 
 She made a movement to depart, but the figure heard her 
 and turned. Turned; and held the torch high over his 
 head and faced her. 
 
 She gave one convulsive start and then stood gazing at 
 him as if petrified. The red torchlight lit up the cavern 
 with a weird fairy-like effect. The white stalactites flashed 
 back a thousand different colors, while the broken crystals 
 in the sand glittered like jewels in a golden setting, and the 
 smoke of the torches rolling upward through the still air 
 seemed twisted columns of dull stone supporting the arched 
 roof. 
 
 They stood confronting each other in profound silence, 
 each gazing as if half-conscious of the other's presence. He 
 was pale and haggard. His eyes were sunken but unnatur- 
 ally bright. His right arm was carried in a sling and his 
 mouth was contracted with pain. She stood there, with 
 glaring eyes, like some wild creature suddenly astounded, 
 pale and gasping for breath; but her brows were lowering, 
 gloomy and terrible.
 
 176 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 And between them yawned the black pit, !rom which 
 came the sound of rushing waters rising like a wall; an im- 
 passable barrier of separation. 
 
 Suddenly he broke the silence. "Ethel!" he said. It 
 was but one word, but in it what a world of pent-up agony, 
 of bitter self-reproach, of dark, terrible hopelessness. 
 
 " Ethel ! " The name came echoing back from the arched 
 roof, and the black galleries caught it up and seemed to 
 send it, in dying echoes, through their dark lengths down 
 to the center of the world. 
 
 She made no answer. 
 
 "What fire is in mine eyes," he murmured, "that the 
 specter of Ethel Leslie rises to haunt me, here in the bowels 
 of the earth?" 
 
 "Arthur!" 
 
 She could hardly believe that she spoke the voice 
 seemed so strange and unnatural, nor was she conscious of 
 having made any exertion to speak. 
 
 Her heart had been frozen, but at that word it seemed 
 to burst its bonds, to become a volcano a seething gulf of 
 fiery passion. She flung her hand up to heaven with a 
 gesture of wild, passionate despair. 
 
 " You here ? " she cried. " You dare to stand before me. 
 You, wretch that you are you villain, who stole my hap- 
 piness devil, who played false with my heart and soul 
 who used me for your own foul purpose you dare to live 
 and to speak to me and call me Ethel ! " 
 
 A low moaning cry echoed through the cavern and he fell 
 upon his knees. 
 
 "See, I kneel to you," he cried. "Forgive me! Oh 
 forgive me ! " 
 
 " Forgive you! " Only two words but oh the volume of 
 scorn that was in the voice that uttered them. 
 
 " Let me confess to you," he moaned. " I have robbed
 
 and betrayed you. I have sinned God knows how greatly. 
 But, oh! believe me, there was a long, hard struggle first. 
 I tried to tread the right and narrow path, but old associa- 
 tions were too strong for me. I struggled to resist tempta- 
 tions; and when I fell, I fell with agony. For I loved you! " 
 
 She gazed at him with a stony, pitiless face. 
 
 " I loved you," he cried to her. " I swear by all the 
 truth on earth, by the great God in heaven, I loved you! " 
 
 The cold, unimpassioned, stony look never left her face. 
 
 Then grovelling before her he told her the history of his 
 life. 
 
 " Hear me! " he cried again to her. " My very hours of 
 life are numbered. Let me not die till I have told you all. 
 I was born and, as a boy, lived near here in the red farm- 
 house by the roadside. I was an only child humored and 
 petted by all. From my earliest days I was restless the 
 quiet, uneventful life at home was even then distasteful to 
 me, and I hailed the earliest opportunity to get away and 
 above all things, and at any price, I wished for wealth. 
 
 "You know not how I fell, but oh! believe that it was 
 not until poverty threatened to deny me many luxuries that 
 were necessary to my life. But the fortunes which I gained, 
 large as they were, were still too small for me I wanted 
 more more. I came to Pomfret determined to rob the 
 bank. There I met you and loved you. By your side I 
 seemed to realize how vile and worthless I was. Your voice 
 and glance seemed ever to bid me lead a new life. And I 
 was a different man when I married you the old spirit ivas 
 dead and a new spirit was in its place. Yes, the old life 
 was dead within me, and if I thought of it at all it was with 
 a shudder of rejoicing at my escape from it. 
 
 ' Yet the old unrest came gradually back to me the 
 quiet, safe life we led palled upon me and I fell. But, 
 oh! the torture of my soul, the agony of my heart, was
 
 178 THE POMFRET ifYSTERY. 
 
 fearful when I was compelled, beyond all power of my will, 
 to be evil once again. 
 
 " Wounded unto death by the detectives as some wild, 
 wounded animal seeks its lair to die, I sought this cave 
 from whose mouth I might once more gaze upon my child- 
 hood's home, and catch a distant glimpse of the figures of 
 those who loved me when I was young, and here, unknown 
 and unseen, die." 
 
 She shuddered as if some noxious reptile had crawled be- 
 fore her. 
 
 "Believe, at least/' he cried "believe, at least, I loved 
 you!" 
 
 He ceased and buried his face in his hands, where he 
 knelt at her feet he did not dare to look at her. Her 
 breath came and went in shuddering gasps. 
 
 "Mercy!" he prayed, stretching his arms out to her. 
 " Mercy !" 
 
 " Too late! Too late!" she answered, hoarsely. 
 
 " Mercy! Mercy! " he still imploringly cried. " Let my 
 love plead for my forgiveness and for mercy!" 
 
 " Your love! " she said. " Your love! Foul, devilish thing 
 that it was, pleads not for mercy, but for vengeance and 
 its prayer shall be heard." 
 
 " By the love which you once bore for me by the mem- 
 ory of the happy days we once spent together have mercy ! " 
 
 She laughed a shrill laugh, like the laugh of a fiend, and 
 ere it had died away and ceased to reverberate through the 
 arched roof and long passage ways, he heard these words, 
 clear and distinct as from a bell: 
 
 "As you had mercy, so shall I have mercy! " 
 
 "Mercy! Mercy!" bemoaned. 
 
 She drew herself up to her full height, and by the light 
 of her uplifted torch he could see the cold scorn of her eyes 
 as she answered:
 
 DYlKCt. 179 
 
 "Too late! Too late!" 
 
 He shook as with an ague. He fell upon his face upon the 
 sand before her, and the torch dropped from his hand and 
 fell naming down the chasm, showing the jagged rocks that 
 lined its sides. 
 
 She stood gazing at him for a moment with scorn and 
 hate in her eyes, and when he raised his head again she had 
 left him. He saw the red light of the receding torch glit- 
 ter upon the crystals along her path that flashed back light- 
 ning gleams of rainbow-colored light from floor and wall 
 and roof saw it grow less and less until but a tiny spark 
 glimmered in the distance, and then that, too, disappeared, 
 and the thick darkness and solemn silence closed in around 
 him like a pall. 
 
 She walked out into the clear daylight. Within her hand 
 was the extinguished torch and in her heart was a cold, 
 remorseless hate. 
 
 The bleak and terrible loneliness with which this man had 
 surrounded himself descended again upon him, as darkness 
 comes upon the earth, but the shadow on his soul had no 
 resemblance to the shades of evening, broken as they are by 
 the flickering light of kindly stars or the rays of the pallid 
 moon. The blackness of the cave was a fitter emblem for 
 the gloom of his inner nature. 
 
 Alone he lay; friendless, weary, dying, forsaken. There 
 was no memory of good done to his fellow-man, no memory 
 of high accomplishment or kindly deed, to shed a ray of 
 hope through his soul. 
 
 Yet in those last moments of his life his mind turned to 
 a deep review of the gradual and marvelous change which he 
 had wrought upon himself by the life which he had led. 
 
 He remembered how the bright stars had smiled upon him 
 in his youth; how the woods and streams had whispered to 
 his boyish heart tales and expectations of honor and glory;
 
 180 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 how in the years gone by, he had left his home, a simple 
 and loving child, and planted his firm and eager footsteps on 
 the threshold of the world. He remembered how fresh and 
 tender his heart had been when first he set out how full 
 of love and sympathy for mankind how responsive and 
 pitying for human guilt and sorrow how earnest in his 
 hope that men would learn to honor and reverence him. 
 
 And now what was the end? Solitude like that of the 
 grave a dying man left to die unwatched and uncared 
 for a path through life marked by crimes and foul with 
 the misery that he had caused. 
 
 As the moments of his life ebbed slowly one by one away, 
 so pictures like these passed on before him. He started up, 
 and the dark cavern seemed alive with demons, grinning 
 and mocking him ready and waiting to bear his soul to 
 perdition. To his failing senses the earth shook with their 
 tread the caverns echoed with their laughter his ears 
 were stunned with their cries. 
 
 He reeled and fell; and up from the bowels of the earth 
 his soul took its flight to answer, at the judgment seat of 
 God, for a mis-spent life. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 HOME AGAIN". 
 
 IT was an astonishing thing that, when Ethel came from the 
 cave and walked back to the little red cottage, she felt cold 
 and calm as ice. The warmer passions of her nature seemed 
 to be burned out, love could not be bruised and bleeding, 
 for it was dead. Death and crime were no longer dreadful. 
 Only the colder passions of hate, distrust and unbelief in 
 nobleness and faith remained.
 
 HOME AGArST. 181 
 
 As she entered the cottage she saw old Mrs. Morrow sit- 
 ting by the fireside. She had no pity for the childless 
 woman, naught but a strong antipathy to her as the mother 
 of one whom she hated and spurned. The very apathy of 
 all that was good and true in her nature was of itself a dis- 
 ease moral if not physical, which, though it made no out- 
 ward sign of its fell presence, yet nevertheless dwelt in her 
 heart. 
 
 She walked with firm footsteps up the stairs and entered 
 the room where Aunt Martha was. 
 
 "Aunt Martha," she said, " we must leave here to-mor- 
 row." 
 
 "To-morrow?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Sakes alive ! what put that notion into your head?" 
 
 " I cannot stay here longer. Everything, everybody, is 
 distasteful, hateful to me." 
 
 " Du tell, why only this morning you were perfectly satis- 
 fied, and you were getting so well here." 
 
 " I am well now." 
 
 " I want to know. "Where do you want to go ?' 
 
 11 Home." 
 
 " Why, Ethel ! you know that's the very worst place for 
 you. Pomfret will bring up old scenes and old thoughts 
 which it were better for you to forget." 
 
 " I can never forget them. But they will not make me 
 ill again never more can I suffer as once I did." 
 
 " If I could only be sure of that." 
 
 " I have put the past away from me. I have buried it 
 to-day. Yonder vast cave is its tomb. Believe me, it will 
 never rise again." 
 
 " But what excuse shall I give?" 
 
 " I care not. But to-morrow I leave here," 
 
 "Ethel, you are ill again,"
 
 182 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " Feel my pulse, Aunt Martha. Does it beat quicker 
 than is its wont. Look at my hand as I hold it out, does it 
 tremble in the least. No, Aunt Martha, I am not ill. I 
 am well." 
 
 " But this sudden change of plan and you give no rea- 
 son T do not understand it at all." 
 
 " Listen, then, and let me tell you. To-day I met him I 
 will not soil my lips with his name." 
 
 " You ! You met your husband! " 
 
 " He never was my husband. The name he bore when 
 he married me was not his own. Even it was stolen." 
 
 "Not his name?" 
 
 " This was his home. These people are his parents 
 these negroes his slaves." 
 
 "Sakes alive!" 
 
 " Do you think that I will stay longer under this roof? 
 No ! Were it not so late we would leave this very night. 
 As it is, we must depart early to-morrow." 
 
 "Will you tell them?" 
 
 " No, let them remain in their trust in him. Let them 
 remember him as true and honest. Better their doubt than 
 their despair. Let there be at least two people in the world 
 whose lives are not blighted with his crimes." 
 
 " Will you not come down to supper?" 
 
 " No. Such things as you may cook with your own hands 
 I will eat, but never more will I break bread nor sit at the 
 table with his parents. Pay our bills, let us be beholden to 
 them for nothing, and to-morrow early let us go away." 
 
 There was nothing for Aunt Martha to do but to make 
 the best excuses she could, and arrange for their departure 
 on the following day. She did not understand all the rea- 
 sons why Ethel was determined to go home, but she knew 
 enough to convince her that it was better to yield than to 
 resist.
 
 HOME AGAIX. 183 
 
 So on the morrow they journeyed towards Pomf ret. 
 
 Aunt Martha had telegraphed ahead of their coming, and 
 both the Squire and the old doctor met them at the station. 
 They had feared that her old illness had returned to Ethel, 
 but when she stepped from the train and greeted them, 
 they knew that their fears were false. 
 
 In Pomfret many things were changed. The detectives, 
 returning baffled from their chase of Arthur Vance, had 
 gathered up the bonds strewn about, and searching beneath 
 the trap-door, found in the pit the bonds Avhich the Jew had 
 dropped and had not waited to carry off. He himself had 
 escaped by outlets at the bottom of the pit. Thus the 
 Pomfret Bank found itself again repossessed of most of its 
 property, and what remained unaccounted for and unre- 
 turned was more than counterbalanced by the money which 
 Vance had paid to relieve the Squire of his responsibilities. 
 
 Thus Ethel came back to her home still an heiress to her 
 father's wealth, and the old Squire once more held his ac- 
 customed place as the richest and most prominent man in 
 the town. 
 
 But there was the home in "Woodside where, though 
 thanksgiving and gladness reigned, there was yet a shadow 
 of the great wrong done Benny Moore. The terrible time 
 when Benny had been accused of the robbery, the suspense 
 of his trial and subsequent legal proceedings had been a 
 heavy burden for his parents to bear. 
 
 And when at last he was a free man once again, his inno- 
 cence established and his good name restored to him, the 
 two old people felt as though they could never part with 
 him. 
 
 But Benny did not wish to stay where there were so 
 many scenes constantly reminding him of the blackest 
 hours of his life, and so he hurried back to New York. 
 The farm was very lonely after he had left; it was hard tp
 
 184 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 go back to the humdrum affairs of every-day life. Duties 
 that had been pleasant before became irksome now to 
 Benny's mother, and she was fast becoming an invalid. 
 Then Mr. Moore's burden became still heavier. 
 
 When, a few days after her return, the old Squire drove 
 Ethel out to Woodside, it seemed to her as if here was the 
 only place where she could visit. Here the great crime, 
 with which she felt so intimately connected, had stretched 
 its shadow and left its blight behind. The sad, broken 
 condition of Mrs. Moore touched and aroused her pity. 
 They both had suffered together, and were bound by the 
 recollection as by a tie that could not be broken. When 
 she remembered the happy home, now broken up, of Benny, 
 aged with the horror of the imputations so maliciously, so 
 cruelly put upon him, she sometimes thought that, even 
 though her husband was dead, she could curse the very 
 memory of his vileness. The robbery of the bank was 
 slighb in comparison to the crime of imputing to a man 
 whom he knew was innocent, an offense so horrible. 
 
 Fortunately for Ethel, she could not brood upon such 
 thoughts for many days. The growing weakness of Mrs. 
 Moore claimed more and more of her attention. She con- 
 stituted herself her nurse, and lived at the farm house. 
 She felt as if, by thus easing the last moments of her old 
 friends' life, she was in some way atoning for the great 
 wrong that her husband had done to them; but had she 
 been able to look into her own soul she would have seen 
 how much good it was doing her thus to devote her own life 
 to another. 
 
 Between the woman dying and the woman whose heart 
 was dead there grew up a solemn and sacred intercourse, 
 and the elder one taught and the younger one learnt lessons 
 of faith and patience. And at last, one night, just before 
 the spirit took its flight from the frail tenement of clay
 
 RESTLESSNESS. 185 
 
 where it had for many years made its home, the elder 
 woman begged a last favor from the younger; and Ethel 
 kneeling by the bedside breathed out a prayer for forgive- 
 ness for her hardness of heart and a petition for pardon for 
 the crimes of her husband. 
 
 CHAPTEK XXV. 
 
 RESTLESSNESS. 
 
 THERE is on the surface of the earth no man, woman or 
 child who can retire from the world and nurse their grief 
 in solitude without neglecting some duty which ought to be 
 performed. Nor could Ethel, much as she wished to do 
 so, retire from the world and brood over her own troubles. 
 The money which her husband had left was hateful to her. 
 He, as has been said, purchased all the Squire's property 
 when the Squire had relinquished it for the bank's benefit, 
 and all the money which he had then paid was now in the 
 bank. This money, less the amount of the securities which 
 were not recovered, was to be returned to him or to Ethel 
 as his wife. 
 
 But if the confession which he had made to her was 
 true, this money belonged to the heirs of the true Arthur 
 Vance. She would not touch a penny of it it was blood 
 money it had brought a curse with it. 
 
 Here, then, was the object which she had to live for to 
 find his heirs and restore them this fortune. She had no 
 knowledge of the dead man to guide her beyond what her 
 husband had told her, and she knew not whether this was 
 true or false. He had not been accustomed to speak much 
 about former times, but racking her brains she remembered 
 that from time to time she had heard him say that his
 
 186 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 (and she believed now that he had meant the father of 
 Arthur Vance) had lived in Louisiana somewhere near 
 New Orleans, and had been killed in Mexico. Slight clues 
 were these to depend upon, and they were rendered more 
 slight by the fact that she knew not whether they were true 
 or not. She was perplexed, also, to know how to proceed 
 to test their verity and follow them out. She foresaw that 
 her researches would necessitate a vast amount of travel, 
 and she shrank from contact with strangers. Her first im- 
 pulse was to send for detectives and employ them, but she 
 was adverse to exposing her husband's wickedness and her 
 own shame to them. 
 
 Many weeks passed while she debated these things in her 
 mind. They grew slowly and took shape as she watched by 
 the bedside of Mrs. Moore; the long quiet hours of the 
 night while the sick woman slumbered were favorable to 
 deep thought. Gradually her resolutions took shape and 
 form,and she determined to unravel the knotty skein herself. 
 
 First of all, a visit to New Orleans was necessary, that she 
 there might search out the history of the Vances and learn 
 who their family connections had been. In pursuance of 
 this plan she journeyed to the South. Her father and Aunt 
 Martha had been greatly surprised when she broached her 
 i utentions to them, and their first impulse was to oppose it, 
 but old Doctor Gamble had come to her assistance, saying 
 that the change would do her good, and that the variety of 
 the scenes which she would pass through would distract her 
 mind from the contemplation of its own sorrows 
 
 Therefore she was allowed to depart without other hin- 
 derances than the tears which the two old people shed when 
 she left them. 
 
 Detective work is slow and tedious; it is like groping in 
 the dai'k after one knows not what. Inch by inch the 
 ^searcher creeps forward, turning now to the one side, then
 
 KESTLESSXESS. 187 
 
 to the other, often finding oneself back at the same point 
 from which one started and being forced to start out again 
 in a new direction. Small trifles govern the direction of 
 one's wanderings, and obstacles are tediously surmounted 
 for no purpose. Great perseverance is required or one be- 
 comes discouraged by repeated failures. But Ethel had all 
 the necessary qualifications of untiring perseverance and in- 
 domitable will. Failure stimulated her to renewed effort. 
 She clung to her occupation with the tenacity of fear, dread- 
 ing to let it slip from her lest her life should become again 
 swallowed up in the dark waves of despair. She fought 
 with the difficulties in her path, obstinately and continu- 
 ously, lest thoughts of her own sorrow should come to her 
 and overmaster her. 
 
 In New Orleans it was hard to find records of the Vances. 
 They belonged to a former era, which the war had driven 
 out of the memory of most dwellers in the Crescent City, 
 and records of births or deaths or marriages had not been 
 carefully kept in the olden time, or had been lost in the ex- 
 citing years of civil conflict. 
 
 Still Ethel pursued her enquiries of every one who she 
 thought would be likely to give her information, until all 
 sources of information were exhausted. Then it occurred 
 to her that among the negro population there must be some 
 old men or old women who had lived with the Vances in 
 olden times and could tell her such family traditions as 
 they remembered, but to search them out was a tedious task, 
 and months were consumed in the operation. But the 
 proverb says that " all things come to him who waits," and 
 so it proved to her. She found at last an old negress who 
 had been the maid of that elderly lady who has been men- 
 tioned as Aunt Matilda. Her, Ethel examined and cross 
 examined until she knew all that the old woman had to tell. 
 She learned the story of Sunbeam and Felice, learned how
 
 188 THE POMFRET MYSTEKY. 
 
 Laurence Vance had lost his life, learned how his daughter 
 had been stolen and how his wife had died. Learned, too, 
 of the rumor that somehow prevailed among the negroes 
 that Sunbeam had stolen the child to be revenged upon 
 his former master. 
 
 And this daughter was the owner of those thousands that 
 stood in the Pomfret Bank awaiting her coming this 
 daughter, who knew not her own parentage and whose 
 identity was hidden among the millions of human beings 
 upon the earth, was to be sought out, identified and en- 
 riched. Hopeless as the task seemed, Ethel gave her whole 
 energies to it. 
 
 Somehow she could not think of this child as dead some 
 intuition in her heart told her that the child still lived. 
 But how should she discover her ? 
 
 In vain she put advertisements in all the Mexican papers 
 asking for news of Sunbeam or Felice no information came 
 to her. Equally vain were her attempts to locate the place 
 where the hacienda San Bene had been. The details she 
 could obtain from the aged negress were all too meager to 
 locate it, and its whereabouts eluded her most careful search. 
 
 The mystery was too deep for her, and she was forced to 
 acknowledge herself baffled for the time being, and she re- 
 turned to Pomfret. 
 
 But the many memories connected with her home made 
 her life there sad, and she began to grow morose and melan- 
 choly and to long for a change. It was, therefore, with 
 delight that she heard that friends in Boston were about to 
 go abroad and wished her to go with them. She gladly ac- 
 cepted their invitation, and bidding farewell once more to 
 her father and Aunt Martha, embarked for a foreign trip. 
 
 But Benny Moore had heard of her determination with 
 sorrow. His love for her had never died out, and so, before 
 fihe sailed, he told her the old, old taje which so many lov-
 
 AUNT MARTHA'S ROMANCE. 189 
 
 ing hearts have heard with sobs and sighs, and quick 
 tumultuous pulsations of the blood. 
 
 " Alas, Benny," she answered, " it cannot be. I can never 
 again love as a wife should. My heart is dead and cold. 
 Forget me think of me as a sister for I never again can 
 be a wife. Be my brother, Benny, and learn to be happy 
 with some one else." 
 
 " It is idle to bid me do that," Benny answered, " I can 
 love only you." 
 
 1 ' You can learn to love some one else if you will but try 
 hard," she answered. "When I return from abroad we 
 will be as brother and sister, but nothing more." 
 
 CHAPTEE XXVI. 
 
 MARTHA'S ROMANCE. 
 
 AFTER Ethel had departed for Europe, leaving her father 
 and Aunt Martha at Pomfret, the old Squire began to ex- 
 hibit a restlessness. Perhaps Ethel's moods had been con- 
 tagious; perhaps it was only that the stirring events of the 
 past years had roused him and stirred his energies, which 
 had been stagnating in the quite country town. 
 
 Whatever the cause may have been, Ethel was no sooner 
 launched on the high seas that the old man announced his 
 intention of visiting the West. Aunt Martha offered to 
 accompany him, but the Squire preferred to go alone. So 
 the spinster was left in the Squire's house. 
 
 There had been a romance in Aunt Martha's life a 
 romance that had kept her unwedded all the intervening 
 years. Fate, which had been of late so busy with the 
 members of the Leslie family, was now to complete its in- 
 terference, by changing the current of Miss Martha's life.
 
 190 tllE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 Miss Martha was not an idle woman. All the time that 
 was not devoted to her house and farm was given to works 
 of charity among her less fortunate neighbors, who lived 
 upon the barren hillsides, at the outskirts of Pomfret, where 
 the soil was so poor that it was worthless for agricultural 
 purposes. 
 
 These people were mostly French Canadians, who had 
 come to Pomfret as farm hands, or drifted thither from the 
 neighboring manufacturing towns. They were the poor, of 
 which, alas, every place has its share, for though Christianity 
 has been successful in many things, it has not yet succeeded 
 in banishing poverty from the world. 
 
 These people had settled on the hillsides because the land 
 there being poor was cheap, and wisely refraining from 
 attempting to cultivate the ground about their dwellings, 
 earned a living as " help " to their richer neighbors. Among 
 them was the arena of Miss Martha's Christian struggles 
 and charities. Scarcely a day passed that she did not visit 
 them on some errand of kindness. She seldom gave 
 money and when she did it was under the pledge of 
 secresy but in many other ways she made herself useful 
 and earned the gratitude of the people. 
 
 It was in the course of one of these charitable excursions, 
 some six weeks before the Christmas eve of the year when 
 the departure of the Squire and Ethel had left the worthy 
 spinster alone, that Miss Martha heard the children of the 
 French Canadian Kaoul Lacrassin talking about " the 
 witch." 
 
 " The witch ! " she exclaimed. " What witch are you 
 talking about? There are no witches nowadays." 
 
 "It's some story they've picked up at school, ma'am," 
 said their mother, who was standing by. "Is it not so, 
 Emile ? " she continued, addressing her son. 
 
 " Years ago there were witches in New England," said
 
 MARTHA'S ROMANCE. 191 
 
 Miss Martha, who never let slip an opportunity of impart- 
 ing historical information to the poor foreigners among 
 whom her patronage was distributed. "Years ago there 
 were witches, and they did much evil; but our pious ances- 
 tors drove them out, with fire and scourging, and they have 
 never come back." 
 
 " Oh, mon Dieu, I have heard tell of them/' ejaculated 
 the Frenchwoman, " they were cruelle!" 
 
 Miss Martha drew herself up with an offended air, and 
 answered with severe dignity, " How often have I have re- 
 quested you, Mrs. Lacrassin, not to take the name of God 
 in vain by your blasphemous expression of ' Mon Dieu ' ! I 
 would have you remember that my ancestors were among 
 those godly men whom you call * cruel,' and to speak of 
 them with more respect when I am present." 
 
 Much of this reproof was lost upon the poor, French- 
 woman, who in truth knew the English language but im- 
 perfectly, but the tone of voice and manner of censure were 
 easy of comprehension. She knew, moreover, by experi- 
 ence, that Miss Martha had an unfailing dislike to that 
 common French expression " Mon Dieu;" and was wonder- 
 ing what she should say to turn aside her benefactress's in- 
 dignation, 'when her perplexity was set at rest by Emile, 
 who had imbibed enough of the Yankee spirit to have far 
 less respect than his mother had for wealth and respecta- 
 bility as represented in the person of Miss Martha. 
 
 "Yes, there are witches!" he said. "Deacon Sumner 
 says so, for I asked him. And old Forzin, who lives up 
 there," pointing to the mountain side, " is one of them." 
 
 "Who?" queried Miss Martha. 
 
 " He means an old man who has made a hut for himself 
 and lives up there among the woods," his mother explained. 
 "He has been there now about three weeks, and twice a 
 week he has come to buy bread of me."
 
 192 THE POMFBET lIYSTERY. 
 
 " And what did you say his name was?" 
 
 " I asked him for his name, and he said that he was 
 M'sieur Forzin." * 
 
 "French?" inquired Miss Martha. 
 
 " He speaks the French, but not like one natif," Mrs. La- 
 crassin answered. 
 
 " Where does he work?" 
 
 " Ah, he does not work ! " 
 
 *' What, a beggar a tramp ! " cried Miss MaHha in a 
 tone of disgust. 
 
 " He look like a beggar but he pay me for my bread." 
 
 " He's a witch," stoutly insisted Emile. " He is just like 
 the witch that Gran'mere Annette used to tell about. He 
 has a great white beard and long white hair, and his feet 
 are all wrapped about with rags. Oh, I tell you, he is a 
 witch ! " 
 
 " A suspicious character," said Miss Martha, to Constable 
 Hicky, who, since the robbery of the bank, had been elected 
 to be assistant to the worthy Delaney, and whom she visited 
 on purpose to impart to him the news which she had heard. 
 ' 'A suspicious character, and one that the s'lectmen ought 
 to look after. Don't you think so ? " 
 
 "Waal," answered Hicky, "he hain't trubbled no un 
 thet I've heerd on yit." 
 
 Miss Martha heard of the old man many times after- 
 wards, and once, guided by Denis Lacrassin, she ventured 
 up to the hut itself, but its inmate was absent, the door was 
 securely fastened and there was no window; so she was obliged 
 to descend without satisfying her curiosity. 
 
 The time flew until it was the evening of the twenty- 
 fourth of December. 
 
 It was Christmas eve, a genuine old-fashioned Christmas 
 eve, such as we read about in story books but seldom ex- 
 perience in actual life a night which in its wildness and
 
 AUNT MARTHA'S ROMANCE. 193 
 
 inclemency makes every home comfort within doors seem 
 more pleasant than usual and makes us more contented 
 with our lot. The snow had been falling all the day and 
 gave promise of continuing to fall all the night, and the 
 wind had been having high sport with the snow flakes, toss- 
 ing them about in every direction. Not that Miss Martha 
 cared much whether it snowed or not. She sat in the cosy 
 sitting room before the blazing wood fire, with her pet tabby- 
 cat curled up on the rug at her feet and a shaded lamp on 
 the center table, and there was no need of her going outside 
 whatever the weather might be. Her hands held a partly 
 knitted stocking, but the needles had dropped to her lap 
 and her hands were idle. Miss Martha was thinking. 
 
 As she sat there in the light of the lamp and the glow of 
 the fire it was hard to realize that Miss Martha had ever 
 been personally attractive. It seemed utterly absurd to as- 
 sociate the idea of romance with her strong, gaunt, angular 
 figure. 
 
 Yet in the past years that had been romance in Miss 
 Martha's life romance and sorrow short-lived joy and 
 long-lasting grief. There had been eventful years years 
 full of history history learned by heart and never to be 
 forgotten. 
 
 And now, as Miss Martha sat in her cosy sitting room 
 gazing abstractedly into the fire, her heart repeated to her 
 the history of those by-gone years. But they were no 
 longer years of the past. They became the present. She 
 lived them over again. Every curl of smoke that rose up 
 the chimney, every glowing coal that loosened itself from 
 the parent log and dropped into the ashes underneath, was 
 the symbol of the passage of days or months or years. 
 
 Ah, many such reveries are witnessed by the fires that 
 burn upon the hearths at homes ! The child, as he sits 
 before the glowing logs dreaming dreams of high hope and 
 7
 
 194 THE POMJFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 ambition, builds castles huge and fair among the glowing 
 coals. In later years, when age has crept upon him and hopes 
 and ambitions are dead within his heart, the fitful flames 
 recall those aspirations of the past, and in the ashes he sees 
 the crumbling and decaying ruins of the stately castles that 
 he built so long before. 
 
 So as Miss Martha sat before the fire in the cozy sitting- 
 room, she recalled the days when she had been the spoiled 
 child of wealth unschooled in self-restraint proud and 
 petulant haughty and cold quick to take offense im- 
 patient of contradiction and reproof liable to sudden out- 
 bursts of passion which, while they lasted, swept all before 
 them. She sighed as she thought how hard and unlovable 
 her nature must have been in those days, before long years 
 of bitter sorrow and regret had broken her pride and tamed 
 her passions. 
 
 The old times came back to her as she sat watching the 
 flickering flames. The familiar sitting-room was changed 
 by the magic of memory into the narrow parlor of a city 
 house, and she saw a young girl, dressed in long, flowing 
 robes of creamy white, with roses at her breast and in her 
 hair, standing by the window half hidden by the curtained 
 drapery. As the vision rose before her memory Miss Martha 
 knew that she saw herself as she had appeared long years ago. 
 
 The sappy logs hissed with the heat, the flames fell and 
 rose, the glowing fragments dropped down upon the hearth, 
 grew dull and turned to gray ashes, Miss Martha saw them 
 not. She was watching the figure of the girl who now, 
 with lips slightly parted, and with a smile struggling with a 
 frown upon her face, turned from the window as a familiar 
 step and a well-known voice was heard in the hall. She 
 had been kept waiting and was vexed and impatient. But 
 the frown faded and the smile made her face radiant with 
 joy as a young man entered. With a cry of pleasure she
 
 AUNT MARTHA'S ROMANCE. 195 
 
 sprang to meet him, and in a few moments he had folded 
 her in his warm, close embrace. Then, lightly laughing, 
 she disengaged herself, and readjusting her rumpled dress 
 said, pouting in mock anger as her previous vexation was 
 remembered, " How late you are, Geoffrey ! " 
 
 " Am I?" he responded, smiling upon her. " It seemed 
 to me that love lent me wings and that I had flown to you." 
 
 " But you are here now/' she said, all vestige of a frown 
 fading from her face before the sunlight of his smile; " but 
 see/' and she pointed to a rose that lay upon the floor, 
 " you have broken my rose ! " 
 
 He stooped and picked it up and raised it to his lips. 
 
 "Fair rose/' he said, "you have rested upon my lady's 
 bosom and I shall treasure you forever hereafter as a souve- 
 nir ! " 
 
 " Foolish fellow ! " she responded, with a peal of rippling 
 laughter. " Do you love me as much as that ?" 
 
 His face darkened as he answered: 
 
 "Martha," he said, in reproachful tones, "how many 
 times have I told you that such questions reflected on my 
 honor ! Have I not told you cannot you believe that I 
 love you ? " 
 
 She started, vexed more at the tone of his voice than at 
 the words he spoke. Like a child reproved she became 
 angry. 
 
 " It was a simple question that I asked you," she replied. 
 " I wished only to be assured that it was myself you loved 
 and not my money." 
 
 " Oh, your money, your money !" he cried, with a ges- 
 ture of rage, " I hate it I hate your possession of it ! I 
 know I am poor, but is. that a reason why you should be 
 always throwing your wealth into my face ? " 
 
 " You are brutal ! " she answered, coldly and haughtily. 
 
 "It is you who are brutal ! " he replied, hotly.
 
 196 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 She drew a ring from her finger and coldly handed it to 
 him, saying as she did so: 
 
 " You have given me proof that you do not love me as I 
 would be loved. No man would speak to the woman he 
 loved as you have spoken to me, what more could I want 
 than the evidence of your own words ? " 
 
 "I did not mean them I" he cried passionately. "Oh 
 Martha, if you were only poor, that I might prove how much 
 I loved you ! But the thought of your wealth the dread 
 that you should think me a fortune-hunter maddens me ! " 
 
 But her anger was aroused and her hand never trembled 
 as she held out the ring his bethrothal gift to her. 
 
 He stood for a moment confronting her, his eyes gazing 
 into hers with a look of supplication and pleading that 
 might have melted a heart of stone; but her heart was only 
 human flesh and blood and she showed no signs of relenting. 
 
 Then his anger rose. 
 
 He seized the glittering bauble from her outstretched 
 hand and dashed it to the floor exclaiming: 
 
 " Lie there, senseless thing as cold and heartless as her 
 to whom I gave you as a token of undying love ! " 
 
 She flashed back a glance of rage and scorn at him. 
 
 " Go ! " she said, pointing to the door. " Go ! " 
 
 He turned and Jeft her, but in the doorway he stopped 
 again and held out his arms imploringly to her, crying: 
 
 " Oh Martha ! Martha ! Before it is too late, forgive me ! 
 Forgive me, and let me stay ! " 
 
 " Go ! " she said sternly. And he, turning away with a 
 gesture of despair, left the house. 
 
 He never returned. 
 
 Miss Martha, in her revery, remembered how, when the 
 hot flush of her senseless anger 'passed, she watched and 
 waited for his return; how, putting her false pride aside, 
 she had sent messengers to find him and bring him back;
 
 ATJXT MABTHA'S KOMAKCE. 197 
 
 and how, with heart that was almost breaking, she had 
 learned that he had disappeared, no one knew whither. 
 
 Oh, those long years of weary watching and waiting, when 
 her whole heart had been purified in the crucible of sorrow 
 when every thing associated with her past life grew hate- 
 ful to her. She had traveled far and wide, hoping to find 
 forgetfulness in change of scene, and with some faint hope, 
 it may have been, that in some foreign country she might by 
 chance meet with some traces of him. The wealth that had 
 stood between them had faded away until but a remnant 
 was left. 
 
 Miss Martha sighed, the firelight glistened from the 
 teardrops in her eyes, and her pet cat rose and stretched 
 himself and glanced at his mistress as if to make sure that 
 nothing was wrong, then coiled himself once more upon the 
 rug and slept again. 
 
 Suddenly, as it were like an awakening from sleep, the 
 past fled away and the reality of the present forced itself 
 upon Miss Martha's consciousness. She breathed another 
 sigh a s igh of regret as she mechanically picked up her 
 needles and resumed her knitting. 
 
 She was not conscious of what had changed the current 
 of her thoughts, some shriek of the wind, perhaps, for now 
 it seemed to be howling more fiercely than ever around the 
 house. Intuitively she fell to Avondering how deep the snow 
 was outside whether it still continued to fall and whether 
 Gustave Lacrassin,the man of -all-work, would return the next 
 morning in time to clear a path to the barn before breakfast. 
 The visions of the tragic past had faded; homely, every-day 
 thoughts engrossed her mind, and the fire had burned low. 
 She stooped and laid a fresh stick of wood upon the and- 
 irons, then carefully rolling up her knitting she laid it on 
 the table and going to the window raised the shade and 
 looked out. The night was very dark, but in the lamplight
 
 198 THE POMFBET MYSTERY. 
 
 that streamed from the window panes, Miss Martha could 
 see that the air was full of snowflakes and knew that the 
 storm still continued. She raised her hand to pull the 
 shade down again, when, through the tumult of the storm, 
 she heard a sound that caused her to pause and listen a 
 sound which came to her ears like the cry of a human voice, 
 yet left her uncertain whether some shriek of the wind had 
 not deceived her hearing. 
 
 She listened patiently, standing motionless so that no 
 rustle of her dress might blur the sound when it came again 
 she waited, listening, until it was repeated, and this time 
 she heard it more clearly. There was no mistaking it now, 
 it was the cry of some one outside in the storm. Nor was 
 it a shout uttered in sport or ])l&j, but rather the cry of one 
 in trouble an earnest despairing cry. 
 
 Miss Martha was perplexed. She was alone in the house, 
 for as it was Christmas eve she had allowed her help to go 
 to their homes upon the hillside, for though Miss Martha, 
 being a stanch Unitarian, did not believe in such celebra- 
 tions, she had no objection to others enjoying them if they 
 wished. But somehow the cry which she had heard carried 
 to her mind the impression that the wanderer, whoever he 
 might be, needed help, and she could not allow him to 
 remain outside in the storm without making at least an 
 effort to assist him yet there was no one to send, for she 
 was alone. 
 
 She listened once again, and once again the cry came 
 ringing through, the air, sounding above the shriek and 
 rumble of the storm. There could be now no room for 
 doubt, it was the cry of a man in trouble, and the sound 
 assumed distinct vocalization, so that the word " Help ! " 
 was clearly distinguishable. 
 
 Yet, for a few minutes more, Miss Martha stood irresolute 
 before the window, while her sensations of fear and realiza-
 
 AUNT MAKTHA'S ROMANCE. 199 
 
 tion of her loneliness combatted with her sense of Christian 
 duty. Then, as if the latter had been victorious, she went 
 into the adjoining room, slipped off the low slippers she 
 had worn and encased her feet in the big rubber boots in 
 which she was accustomed to tramp through the snow. She 
 tied a warm quilted hood about her head, threw over her 
 shoulders a warm thick cloak, and going into the kitchen 
 lighted the lantern that hung ready for use upon its accus- 
 tomed hook. That done she drew on her long mittens of 
 knitted yarn and stood arrayed for her excursion. 
 
 Her actions had aroused the cat upon the rug, who now 
 rose slowly and stretching first one leg and then the other 
 gravely watched his mistress. Miss Martha gave a glance 
 of regret at the warm, snug sitting-room, threw a few more 
 logs of wood upon the fire and then went resolutely out 
 through the front door. 
 
 A gust of wind and a flurry of snow greeted her as she 
 emerged into the open air, but simultaneously, as if to en- 
 courage her to persevere, came again the cry, twice repeated, 
 "Help! Help!" 
 
 Closing the door behind her, Miss Martha plunged bravely 
 into the snow and plowed through the drifts until she 
 reached the road side. There she halted for a few minutes 
 to recover her breath and to decide what direction she would 
 take. She thought of going to Deacon White's and rousing 
 him, since he was her nearest neighbor, and intuitively she 
 glanced in the direction of his house; but she saw no light 
 glimmering through the windows, all was shrouded in dark- 
 ness and she knew by those signs that the Deacon and all 
 his family were in bed and that it would consume precious 
 time to arouse him and explain what was wanted. While she 
 thus pondered what to do, happening to cast down her eyes, 
 she noticed a movement of the snow at her feet; and start- 
 ing back in trepidation she turned the lantern upon the
 
 200 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 spot and saw, much to her relief, the form of her own pet 
 cat. 
 
 " Why, Tabby ! " she exclaimed, " this is no weather for 
 you to be out in ! " 
 
 In answer, as it were, the cat arched its back and purred 
 and rubbed itself against her dress. 
 
 Somehow the presence of this familiar animal, although 
 it was only a cat, seemed to encourage Miss Martha and to 
 take away that terrible sense of loneliness which had op- 
 pressed her. She stooped down to pick him up, but he 
 bounded away through the snow and was lost to sight. As 
 Miss Martha raised herself erect the cry came again, as if to 
 direct her, from down the hill. 
 
 Miss Martha put herself in motion and plunged on, keep- 
 ing as nearly as she could judge in the middle of the road. 
 The night was very dark, the lantern shed but little light 
 around, and the snow had drifted over the fences so that 
 there were no landmarks to guide her. Oftentimes, in spite 
 of all the care that she could exercise, she found herself waist 
 deep in the snow, and knew that she had wandered into 
 the ditch by the roadside. 
 
 The snow was knee deep in the shallowest places and 
 deeper where some inequality of the banks on either side 
 had caused it to accumulate. It was hard work making 
 her way through it, and she was forced many times to 
 stop and rest and recover breath. The wind caught her 
 cloak and twisted it about her, impeding her movements, 
 and the light of the lantern nickered and threatened to be 
 blown out. 
 
 She went on thus for perhaps five hundred yards, then 
 stopped and raising her voice cried aloud, " Halloo ! " 
 
 A faint " meow," coming from a few feet in front of her 
 was the only response. Guided by that she struggled a few 
 paces forward and saw by the lantern's feeble light a black 
 figure prostrate in the snow before her.
 
 AUNT MAKTHA'S ROMANCE. 201 
 
 Now that her quest was at an end she was puzzled what 
 to do next. She had not stopped to consider 'this aspect 
 of the case somehow she had assumed that when once she 
 had reached the wayfarer everything else would be simpli- 
 fied but now, if he was helpless to aid himself, as he ap- 
 peared to be, what should she do? 
 
 She bent over the figure, and by the light of the lantern 
 examined it. It was the figure of a man a tramp ap- 
 parently the face was overgrown with a thick mass of hair, 
 white as the snow which half shrouded it, and this almost 
 hid the features from sight the form was wrapped in old 
 and ragged clothes, now stiff and hard from the snow which 
 encrusted them. 
 
 The man lived she saw that ley his breathing but he 
 had fallen into that slumber which is produced by exhaus- 
 tion and extreme cold. He had succumbed to that over- 
 mastering desire for sleep, which is more deadly to the 
 traveler in winter time than all else. 
 
 She shook him by the arm, crying, " Wake up ! Wake 
 up, man ! You will die if you don't wake up ! " 
 
 But he was merely momentarily aroused, and only mut- 
 tered a few incoherent words and then sank to sleep again, 
 lying at her feet almost as senseless and motionless as a log. 
 Then all Miss Martha's fear came back upon her all that 
 overpowering dread of being alone in the night-time, that 
 sometimes will overtake the strongest. She felt an almost 
 irresistible desire to hasten home again. She actually found 
 herself wishing that she had retired to rest early in the 
 evening so that she might not have heard the cry which 
 had induced her to go forth into the storrn. 
 
 But these thoughts were only momentary. Miss Martha 
 put them aside almost as soon as her brain had formed 
 them, and turned to the business on hand the rescue of 
 the perishing stranger. She raised her voice and screamed
 
 202 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 as loud as she could and stood peering into the darkness 
 waiting for" an answer. The roar of the wind, which, to 
 her excited imagination, seemed to take the sound of laugh- 
 ter, as if the fiends of the air were mocking her, was her 
 only response. Again she screamed and again. Thrice 
 but no human voice replied. She must rely upon herself 
 and not upon others, and she alone, unaided, must somehow 
 get the man to her house. 
 
 Shakings, repeated over and over again, proved unavail- 
 ing to rouse him. They only elicited those incoherent 
 sounds which seemed so much like words and yet conveyed 
 no sense nor meaning. 
 
 At last, afraid of wasting more time, Miss Martha bravely 
 seized the prostrate man by the arm and began to drag him 
 up the hill. 
 
 It was hard work. It had been hard going down the 
 slope of the road, it was doubly hard reascending and drag- 
 ging him after. The keen wind was now in her face, and 
 the sharp particles of the driving snow stung and bruised 
 as they struck her. The snow seemed to cling to her feet 
 as if it would hold her fast forever, and encumbered as she 
 was by the helpless form of the man, her progress seemed 
 almost insensible. The wind blew under her cloak and 
 streamed it out like a banner the snow blinded her the 
 lantern nickered so that at times its light was almost inap- 
 preciable every few steps she was obliged to stop and get 
 her breath again. 
 
 To her dying day Miss Martha never knew how she ac- 
 complished the task. Speaking of it afterwards, she was 
 wont to declare that of the period between the time when 
 she first began her reascent of the hill to the time when she 
 found herself and her burden in the front hall of her own 
 warm house, she remembered nothing except a vague, terri- 
 ble horror that blotted out the perception of the reality.
 
 'MISS MARTHA BRAVELY SEIZED THE PROSTRATE MAN BY THE ABM AND BEGAN TO 
 
 DRAG HIM UP THE HILL." Page 203.
 
 204 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 When she had reached home she looked at the clock and 
 found that two hours had passed since she had set forth 
 upon her errand of mercy only two hours yet they had 
 seemed an eternity to her. 
 
 Utterly worn out, Miss Martha sank into a chair in her 
 front hall and stayed there until her strength had partly 
 returned. Then she dragged the still unconscious man into 
 her sitting-room, and without waiting to discard her wraps 
 she busied herself in reviving him. 
 
 The fire had burnt low, she threw an armful of kindlings 
 and sticks upon it, and while they smoked and caught and 
 began to blaze she knelt over the waif whom she had rescued 
 and began to unwrap his snow-soaked garments and to chafe 
 his hands and feet as vigorously as she was able. 
 
 At last her efforts met with success and the sufferer 
 opened his eyes and gazed around him, and muttering 
 a faint " Where am I?" strove to rise. But he was as yet 
 too weak, and when he had half risen he fell back upon the 
 floor. Still Miss Martha felt wonderfully relieved that he 
 had ai last regained consciousness. 
 
 "You are safe/' she said rising to her feet. "Stay 
 quietly where you are until I bring you a cup of tea." 
 
 While the water boiled Miss Martha busied herself in 
 removing her own damp garments, and then set bread and 
 meat and butter upon a plate, rightly judging that the man 
 had been overcome as much by the want of food as by ex- 
 posure to the storm. 
 
 lie drank eagerly of the tea she gave him, and ate raven- 
 ously of the food she set before him, tearing and swallowing 
 it like some wild animal rather than like a human being. 
 
 The meat and drink and the warm air revived him so that 
 he was able to sit up. He had said nothing since his first 
 brief exclamation upon regaining consciousness, but all the 
 while his eyes had followed Miss Martha's form as she moved 
 about the room.
 
 AUHT MARTHA'S ROMANCE. 205 
 
 Miss Martha helped him into the big rocking chair before 
 the fire her own particular chair, that no one except the 
 minister or she herself had sat in since it had been brought 
 to Pomfret and then, for the first time, she noticed the sad 
 plight of the sitting room. The snow which had been 
 dragged in had collected in puddles of melted slush upon 
 her nice ingrain carpet, and the man's cap and cloak and 
 torn shoes were scattered promiscuously about. Her first 
 care was to sop up the water, and her second to tidy the 
 room somewhat. 
 
 Then Miss Martha went back to the kitchen and put 
 aside the remnants of the meal; and when her hands could 
 find nothing more to do she sat by the kitchen fire and fell 
 to wondering what next would happen. 
 
 It was now long past midnight about the hour, per- 
 haps, that the angels, centuries ago, were telling to the 
 shepherds the glad tidings of " Peace upon earth and good 
 will towards men." Somehow Miss Martha, sitting alone in 
 the kitchen, with that rough unkempt figure in the next 
 room, found inexpressible comfort in the thought of the 
 Nativity. 
 
 She rose cautiously from her chair and looked through 
 the half -opened door into the sitting-room. He was asleep 
 now asleep in the rocking-chair and oh, strange sight ! 
 the cat, usually so chary with strangers, had leaped into his 
 lap and was curled up there into a warm, soft ball, upon 
 which one of his thin hands rested. Miss Martha was won- 
 derfully reassured at this, for who that has pets among the 
 brute creation does not grow to rely upon their instincts. 
 
 The hours went slowly by. Miss Martha dared not go to 
 sleep; weary and fatigued as she was she felt that she must 
 keep awake. She moved her chair to where she could com- 
 mand a view of the sleeping figure in the big rocker. 
 
 Slowly, as she continued to watch him, there grew upon
 
 206 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 her a vague faint sense of recognition, as if through the 
 fog and mist of years, there was dawning a recollection of 
 some one long forgotten. 
 
 Miss Martha was wide awake now indeed her senses 
 seemed to be preternaturally alert. She heard the ticking 
 of the tall clock by the fire-place; she realized that the noise 
 of the storm outside was growing fainter, sure sign that the 
 morning would soon dawn; she even heard the low breath- 
 ing of the man slumbering in the sitting-room. She heard 
 and recognized all these sounds, but she took no heed of 
 them. All her faculties seemed to be engrossed in striving 
 to follow out, to solve, that vague sense of recognition 
 which, every moment, seemed to grow more sure and more 
 distinct. Then, of a sudden, like an over-mastering wave 
 sweeping aside all the barriers of memory, the knowledge 
 came upon her, and with a cry of " Geoffrey ! " she started 
 up and stood in the doorway with her arms stretched out 
 towards the thin, bent figure in the rocking-chair. 
 
 " Geoffrey ! " The cry echoed through the house and 
 was repeated through the halls and in the rooms, as if other 
 voices reiterated and prolonged it. It scared the rats in the 
 cellar and sent them scampering to their retreats; it fright- 
 ened the mice in the garret and drove them in sudden haste 
 to their holes; it roused the man sleeping in the sitting- 
 room and he sprang to his feet and stood confronting her. 
 
 For one moment they stood facing each other, then with 
 a moan of anguish, he fell upon his knees before her. 
 
 " Forgive me ! Oh, forgive me ! " he cried. 
 
 Her face was transfigured as she bent over him smiling, 
 and in a soft, sweet voice, resonant with a wonderful glad- 
 ness, said: 
 
 " You were forgiven long ago ! Forgiven long ago, . 
 Geoffrey ! 
 
 But yet he did not dare to look up at her, but knelt at 
 her feet and said in trembling tones:
 
 AUXT JIARTHA'S ROJtAXCE. 20? 
 
 " I sinned against you, but oh, forgive, for I have been 
 punished for my sin ! Remorse has followed me everywhere 
 waking or sleeping it has haunted me. Bitter has been 
 my punishment ! Oh, pardon me ! Forgive me ! " 
 
 Again in soft, sweet tones she said, " I have forgiven you 
 long ago." 
 
 Still he heeded not her words; his voice rose in a wailing 
 cry as he continued: 
 
 " I have seen you in my dreams, sometimes fair and beau- 
 tiful as the day when I left you, sometimes stern and relent- 
 less as if you condemned me to eternal punishment. The 
 memory of you haunted me I could not forget ! And so 
 at last I sought you out, that I once more might gaze upon 
 your face. I built a cabin, high up on the hillside, from 
 whence I could watch your comings and your goings. The 
 children hooted at me when I came down to buy bread and 
 called me ' witch/ and twice you passed within a rod of me, 
 as I, like some wild thing, lay hid among the bushes by the 
 side of your path. So at last I shunned the neighbors and 
 went afar off to purchase my scanty supplies." 
 
 He paused for a moment, as if overcome by weakness, 
 but quickly rallying resumed: " I was returning from such 
 a journey when the storm overtook me. I struggled on, 
 growing more weak and weary with every step as the night 
 fell. It seemed to me that the wind shrieked out your 
 name that the driving snow assumed your image and 
 danced around me in a wild weird dance, as if mocking me. 
 Sleep overpowered me and I knew no more until I opened 
 my eyes and saw you bending over me. Oh, can you par- 
 don me ! Oh, say that you have forgiven me ! " 
 
 She did not speak, but she bent over and kissed him, and 
 as he felt the warm caress he looked up, his eyes met hers 
 and he knew that he was forgiven. 
 
 Then he fell forward, and sobbing like a child, he seized 
 the hem of her gown and kissed it again and again.
 
 208 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 She bent down and raised him, but he started away from 
 her and exclaimed wildly: " I am not fit to be forgiven ! 
 Oh, my God, why taunt me thus with dreams that will dis- 
 solve with my awakening ! " 
 
 She took his hand in hers, and said in a low voice, full 
 of pity and tenderness, " Hear me ! Look at me, Geoffrey ! 
 This is no dream. God hath given us again to each other. 
 It is His Christmas gift. I was not blameless it was my 
 pride my senseless anger that drove you away. I also 
 must beg for forgiveness." 
 
 He gazed at her with wide open eyes and parted lips, as 
 if his soul would drink in the meaning of her words. 
 
 " Oh, my love, my love ! " she cried, while her voice 
 trembled and tears glistened in her eyes " Oh, my love, my 
 love ! I have loved you through all these long years of 
 lonely watching and weary waiting ! " 
 
 A look of ineffable happiness passed over his face, but 
 the joy was too great for his enfeebled frame to bear and 
 he sank fainting into the chair. 
 
 She hastened to administer restoratives and when he had 
 regained consciousness, she drew a chair close to the big 
 rocker and sat by his side. 
 
 The hours passed while he gently slumbered, his thin, 
 wasted hand clasped between her firmer, stronger ones; 
 until the first faint flush of the rising sun shone in at the 
 window and bade them rejoice that it was the dawn of 
 Christmas Day.
 
 CHARLOTTE. 209 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 CHARLOTTE. 
 
 THAT great highway of commerce in the City of New 
 York known as Broadway is continued far beyond the city 
 limits out past the green fields and wooded hills of the 
 valley of the Hudson. Where the tall stone and iron dwell- 
 ings become more and more infrequent it loses its character 
 of a city street and becomes the highway between "New York 
 and Albany full of old revolutionary legends, such as the 
 capture of Andre and the exploits of the cow-boys, and in 
 the less frequented portions still linger memories of the old 
 days of stage-coaches. 
 
 By the side of this road, and in the limits of Tarrytown, 
 there stands an inn. From time immemorial there had been 
 a house of entertainment on the same site. Old Dierck 
 Van Twiller had purchased the land from the Patroon for 
 ten golden guilders and had bought the title and goodwill 
 of the Indians for two bottles of gin and a piece of red cloth. 
 
 He had hewn down the trees and built a low house and 
 hung out the sign of an inn while his nearest neighbor was 
 ten miles away. But other settlers soon gathered about him, 
 and the farm and the river provided meanwhile for his 
 modest wants. 
 
 The house he built was burned down in the Revolution 
 and remained in ashes until peace was declared then his 
 great-grandson, coming back from the Continental army, 
 which he had followed from place to place as a sutler, and 
 possibly as a fighting man also, claimed the property, built 
 a new house and put up a new sign where the old one used
 
 216 iHE POM^RET MYSTERY. 
 
 to swing. It was here that the stages from New York to 
 Albany stopped for supper until the railroad drove them 
 from existence. This in turn grew old and was pulled 
 down and the present structure was erected in its place. 
 
 Some descendants of old Van Twiller had always dispensed 
 hospitality within it, and now James Patrick Nierck seven 
 generations in descent from the old Dutchman was host and 
 master, having inherited the place and the responsibilities 
 from his mother G-retchen. 
 
 It was a stormy evening in the latter part of October. 
 The rain had been falling in a steady deluge all the after- 
 noon and everything was watersoaked. The trees shook 
 down their leaves with every gust of cold, damp wind, J;he 
 road grew softer and softer as the water collected in the 
 wheel ruts and hollows, the fields lay bare and desolate, and 
 the river was shrouded in the curtain of falling water. 
 
 Inside the inn, however, all was cheerful, bright and 
 comfortable, for this was the first evening that Gertrude 
 Nierck and her lately born baby had come down stairs, and 
 in honor of the event the young husband and father had 
 built a fire in the sitting room. In the ruddy light of 
 this the young couple sat, Gertrude, with her hands folded, 
 gazing listlessly into the fire and James Patrick playing with 
 the baby who lay upon his lap. 
 
 " Ah, it is pleasant to get down stairs once more," the 
 wife said. " Just think for two months I have not been 
 in this room ! " 
 
 " If it has seemed long'to you, it has seemed longer to me, 
 dear," her husband replied. 
 
 " How it storms ! " she continued, as a fiercer gust shook 
 the building and drove the rain against the window panes. 
 " Hark! was not that a carriage stopping at the door?" 
 
 " It did stop, but it has gone on now," he answered after 
 listening for a moment, and speaking as the sound of wheels 
 splashing through the mud and water died away.
 
 CHARLOTTE. 211 
 
 Soon his loving glances noticed that his wife once or twice 
 started and glanced at the baby on his knee as if something 
 had alarmed her. 
 
 " What is it, my dear ? " he asked. 
 
 " I thought I heard a child crying. What a night for an 
 infant to be out ! " 
 
 " You heard only the wind." 
 
 " ISTo! " she insisted. " Oh, James, do go and see if any one 
 is at the door!" 
 
 He laughed as he answered, " The door is open and Tim 
 is in the bar. They can come in if they like." 
 
 " But to please me, James, go and look out." 
 
 He smiled as he lazily placed the baby in her lap and 
 lingered to shake its tiny foot. She heard him pass through 
 the hall and heard his merry voice speaking to Tim as he 
 paused for a moment at the bar room. Then she heard the 
 windows rattle as he opened the door and knew that he stood 
 upon the threshold. Soon he returned and laid a basket at 
 her feet, as he did so, saying: 
 
 " You were right, and I am glad I went." 
 
 She looked down and saw lying there an infant wrapped 
 in a coarse plaid shawl, and with a handkerchief tied over 
 its tiny head as if some one had made a last, vain endeavor 
 to protect it from the storm. 
 
 The little one was blue with the cold, and set up a faint 
 wail as she lifted it and began to remove the wet wrappings. 
 It was a little girl baby, thin and weak, but there was noth- 
 ing to show whence she had come nor what the names of 
 her parents were. Only the handkerchief was of the finest 
 cambric and on it was embroidered the name " Charlotte." 
 She was clothed and fed and put to sleep in an old cradle. 
 
 The fate of the little baby was not left long to hang in 
 the balance. The warm-hearted young couple decided to 
 keep her until they heard something of her parents, and if
 
 212 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 they heard nothing to adopt her. Nothing was heard and 
 the two children grew up as if brother and sister. 
 
 Ten years passed away and no other children came to 
 gladden the parents' hearts; but little James and little 
 Charlotte, for so the children had been christened, still lived 
 and enjoyed life as only children can, and made the place 
 ring with their merry laughter. Ten years had made a 
 change in the appearance of the children, James a baby no 
 longer had grown up into a tall, sturdy lad, with brown 
 hair and eyes, and ruddy, sunburnt cheeks. Charlotte 
 the little waif and stray had become a black-haired, blue 
 eyed, white-skinned little maiden, full of pranks and fun, 
 and ever ready to lead her more stolid and sober playfellow 
 into all the mischief that her busy little brain could devise. 
 
 But the girl had one gift which the country people could 
 delight in, even if they did not know its full value. She 
 sang, with a voice sweet and clear as a bell, all sorts of 
 music ballads which the people of the village sang, hymns 
 which she heard in church, scraps of melodies which itiner- 
 ant organ-grinders ground out from their wheezy hand- 
 organs. The gift of song was hers by nature; she had but to 
 hear a song once and she would remember it, clearing it 
 intuitively from all the false notes and imperfections which 
 the performer or the instrument had given to it, and fitting 
 the words of some old poem to it. 
 
 This gift of hers became well known through the neigh- 
 borhood, and it was not uncommon for the neighbors to col- 
 lect at her adopted father's and persuade her to sing for 
 them. 
 
 One summer afternoon she was swinging in a hammock 
 among the tall lilac bushes in the garden. The hammock hung 
 from the branches of a moss-grown apple-tree, whose dark- 
 green foliage shaded it from the sun, and the lilac bushes 
 hid it from the sight of passers-by on the highway. A quaint
 
 CHABLOTTE. 213 
 
 and curious space was this old garden attached to the inn; 
 for some reason it had been allowed to run wild, and the 
 box bordering the beds had grown wide and tall, the once 
 graveled paths were softly carpeted with moss and weeds, 
 the rose bushes, the blackberry vines and the lilacs had grown 
 larger and more tangled every year, while the earth beneath 
 and around them was spangled with pansies, heliotropes, 
 and such other flowers as sprang up year after year from 
 self-sown seeds. It was a perfect jungle, through which 
 the children had made paths, and of which they, the hens 
 and the birds, were the only denizens. 
 
 Lying here in the hammock one summer afternoon, Char- 
 lotte began to sing, almost unconscious of the effort, for song 
 came to her as spontaneously as it did to the birds. Her 
 clear, pure voice soared upwards like the song of a lark at 
 early dawn, and caught the ear of the occupant of a carriage 
 which was leisurely rolling along the road. She bid her 
 coachman stop and she listened until the song was finished. 
 
 The listener was well skilled in the knowledge of music, 
 and had listened to the greatest prima-donnas of Europe, 
 for though she made her home on the banks of the Hudson 
 she had spent many years in traveling abroad, but it seemed 
 to her that never before had she heard so pure and youth- 
 ful a voice. She detected at once that it was crude and un- 
 cultivated, but her curiosity was strong to learn the singer's 
 name. 
 
 She asked her coachman, but he was a new servant and 
 did not know. No one Avas in sight of whom she could ask, 
 and she was about to drive on when she caught sight of a 
 child's face framed in masses of dark hair, peeping out from 
 the parted branches of the bushes. 
 
 She called to her, " My child, will you come here for a 
 minute." 
 
 The bushes parted and a girl stepped out to the carriage
 
 214 THE TOMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 side. It was a scene for a painter the ten-year-old child, 
 with bare feet and short gown, and sun-bonnet hanging on 
 her back held by its strings round her neck, standing by 
 the side of the glistening carriage and the glossy horses in 
 their rich harness. It was a contrast between young, h ealthy 
 poverty, and aged decrepit wealth. The sunbeams that 
 flickered through the branches overhead, fell alike on the 
 white-haired invalid reclining on the soft seats of her car- 
 riage, and upon the tangled brown curls of the maiden 
 standing on the green turf, and Avondering why she had 
 been summoned. 
 
 "Child, can you tell me who was singing?" asked the 
 invalid. 
 
 " I was, ma'am." 
 
 " You, child!" 
 
 "Yes, ma'am." 
 
 " Is it possible ! Such a voice and so young ! What is 
 your name, child ? " 
 
 "Charlotte Nierck, ma'am." 
 
 "And where do you live, child?" 
 
 The girl raised her arm and pointed to the inn. " There, 
 ma'am." 
 
 ' ' And can you come and sing for me sometimes at my 
 house ? Do you know where I live. " 
 
 "Yes, ma'am, up yonder in a big stone house. I can 
 come if my mother will let me." 
 
 "Will you ask her? Or stay ! I will ask her myself. 
 Will you run and ask her to step to the door for a mo- 
 ment?" 
 
 The child sped on her errand, and the carriage turned 
 back to the inn. 
 
 Mrs. Merck's consent was gained without demur, and 
 twice a week Charlotte, with shoes upon her feet, her brown 
 .locks carefully brushed, and her best gown and hat, went
 
 A STJRAXGE DISEASE. 21o 
 
 to the big house and sang to Mrs. Mason. Even the inar- 
 tistic apparel which she wore could not hide the innate re- 
 finement and grace which the child possessed, and Mrs. 
 Mason grew more and more interested in her, and this in- 
 terest was not lessened when she heard her histor} r . 
 
 Charlotte did not go alone upon these visits, for little 
 James, dressed in his best clothes, accompanied her and sat 
 on the steps outside while she sang. And when the sing- 
 ing was done the two children were allowed to wander 
 through the garden with Mrs. Mason, and to gather all the 
 fruit that they could eat. She would often pluck them nose- 
 gays to take home. When the cold days came and the big 
 house was to be closed for the winter, Mrs. Mason sent her 
 protegee to school in Xew York. 
 
 This was the first parting of the children, and this was 
 the first sorrow which shadowed their lives. But before 
 they parted, he to remain at home, she to go to the great 
 school, they promised never, never to forget each other and 
 never, never to cease to love one another. She gave to him 
 a bright red woolen scarf which had often kept her warm 
 in winter, and he gave to her his chiefest of treasures his 
 pocket knife. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 A STRANGE DISEASE. 
 
 IN the vacations Charlotte came home to the country inn. 
 There was no place like it, she declared. There was some- 
 thing which it had that the great beautiful city could not 
 have, something that the rest of the world forever lacked. 
 Later, when she grew up, she knew that this something was 
 the old associations of her childhood, the old memories of 
 her home,
 
 216 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 The children changed with the seasons and the years. 
 James grew taller and more sturdy, and went to New York 
 to be an office boy in a merchant's office. Charlotte grew 
 taller and more sedate the lithe little girl was growing 
 into a beautiful, sensible young woman. 
 
 The girl's musical education had not been neglected. 
 Mrs. Mason had placed her under the instruction of the best 
 masters that the city could afford, and now that she had 
 learned all that they could teach her she was to be sent 
 abroad to study under the masters of Paris and Vienna. 
 Mrs. Mason was herself to go with her, so that she should 
 not be unprotected. Three years she was to be away, then 
 she would come back. 
 
 Three years ! A long while to look forward to, a long 
 period, perhaps, while they are being lived, but ah, short 
 too short when one looks back at them. But Charlotte 
 promised to write each month long letters, telling of her 
 journey and of the strange scenes she saw, and the queer 
 people that she met in foreign lands. And who knows, she 
 said, but what, when she came back, she could earn money 
 by her singing, and in time become great and famous. 
 
 Youth is hopeful and Fame is something pleasant to look 
 forward to until the soul has been chilled by disappoint- 
 ment and defeat. 
 
 So the great iron steamer bore Charlotte and Mrs. Mason 
 across the ocean. 
 
 Then there came to the little post-office of the quiet vil- 
 lage of Tarrytown, letters with foreign stamps and queer 
 postmarks. Letters from Charlotte telling of their jour- 
 ney across the ocean, and the queer fellow-passengers who 
 had sailed with them; describing the scenes they visited, 
 and the quaint customs of the places where they stopped. 
 Letters telling of her new pursuits and occupations, and 
 containing descriptions of her masters and fellow-pupils,
 
 A STRAXGE DISEASE. 217 
 
 and accounts of how she progressed in her singing. And 
 from the village, other answering letters were sent east- 
 ward; letters from the old folks, telling of the little inci- 
 dents in their quiet, humdrum lives; letters from James, 
 telling how he was succeeding in his business career, and 
 had become the confidential clerk of his employers. 
 
 But letters are at the best unsatisfactory things. There 
 is always something hidden by them. Soul cannot com- 
 municate with soul, heart cannot blend with heart through 
 their instrumentality, nor through the agency of stiff and 
 formal phrases. Hopes and fears may be whispered by 
 friend to friend, and doubts and fears may be imparted in 
 quiet low tones at dusky eventide; but these may not be 
 coldly written out in black and white nor the method of 
 their telling arranged and calculated. 
 
 So these letters, which were despatched to and fro, each 
 hid something from those to whom they were sent. Char- 
 lotte's were gay, bright and chatty, but they did not tell of 
 the difficulties and trials which she was forced to surmount, 
 and the letters from the old folks at home hid the growing 
 burdens which old age was placing upon them, and their in- 
 creasing loneliness. 
 
 The three years lengthened into four, and the four years 
 lengthened into five and six and seven, and yet Charlotte did 
 not return to America. Mrs. Mason had been growing 
 more and more feeble as the years rolled by, and Charlotte 
 became more and more necessary to her benefactress. The 
 idea of her appearing in public as a singer had been post- 
 poned, but she still continued to study and perfect herself in 
 her art. She had many friends abroad, and her home in 
 America, though not forgotten, seemed to be something 
 vaguely belonging to the past something apart and sepa- 
 rate from her present life. 
 
 Letters still continued to come and go. But those from
 
 218 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 Charlotte did not tell of the hot bitter tears that of late had 
 wet her pillow at night, did not tell of the growing difficulty 
 with which she read the notes of her music, the filmy cloud 
 which seemed ever to come between her and the world, the 
 sharp pain that shot through her eyes as she gazed at any 
 bright light, the terrible dread that she was growing blind. 
 So in America they did not know of this terrible misfortune 
 which was overhanging the. life of their heart's idol, until 
 one day there came a letter to them telling the sad tale of 
 how the girl's fears had come true and the dreaded affliction 
 had fallen upon her and she was blind. Not altogether 
 blind as yet for she could still distinguish light from dark- 
 ness and vaguely discern such objects as were large and close 
 at hand. But the Parisian doctors dared not to give her 
 hope and she was to go to Vienna to consult the famous 
 Baron Von Else the foremost oculist of the world. 
 
 That letter brought sadness to all to whom it was sent. 
 To James it seemed as if he must now fulfill his duty to 
 his adopted sister by relinquishing the hope of his life by 
 blotting out the love which he had just begun to realize that 
 he felt for his employer's daughter; to the old people it was 
 the death* knell of all the proud, fond hopes with which they 
 had solaced their loneliness. How earnestly they expected 
 another letter and how long seemed the delay before it came 
 telling how Charlotte had seen the great Vienna specialist! 
 
 Yes, she had seen him. A closed carriage had brought 
 her to his door, and the friendly hand of her kind patroness 
 had guided her into the consultation room. He had listened 
 to the symptoms as she detailed them, calmly at first but 
 with growing interest, and he had looked into her eyes care- 
 fully, indeed, but almost with eagerness. Then he had 
 asked her name. " Charlotte Nierck ! " He shook his head 
 as if disappointed. 
 
 " Tell me/' he said, " do you know Madame De Castro?"
 
 A STRANGE DISEASE. 219 
 
 She shook her head after a moment's pause and answered, 
 "No, I do not think I do." 
 
 " She was born in America. Her maiden name I do not 
 know. Her husband was a Spaniard." 
 
 " No, I do not know her. Tell me of my eyes. Shall I 
 see again?" 
 
 "Ah, that we shall know better by and by; but Madame 
 De Castro - 
 
 " What of Madame De Castro? How can she affect my 
 sight?" 
 
 " Mam'selle, I will tell you. You have a disease of the 
 eye which is very rare not six cases are reported in the 
 books. But strange as it may seem, this very year I have 
 seen another. Madame De Castro had the same disease 
 ah, it is very rare ! But it is not that which makes me ask 
 this question, but it is because this disease has never yet, 
 that we know of, arisen of itself, but has always come as an 
 inheritance from some progenitor ah, I will not believe 
 that you have not some ancestor in common." 
 
 Good Mrs. Mason had listened with interest to the Baron's 
 explanation. She did not think it necessary to disclose to 
 him the mystery that hung over Charlotte's parentage, but 
 she had a desire for further information. So she said: 
 
 " But, Baron, some one must have had this disease for 
 the first time." 
 
 " Certainly, Madame, but the books do not know who it 
 was." 
 
 "Why, then, should it not originate in Charlotte?" 
 
 "Ah, Madame, these diseases which are inherited change 
 their character with succeeding generations. The disease 
 of the descendant has minute but perceptible differences 
 from the disease of the ancestor, so that from the symptoms 
 of the disease we can tell to what generation it belongs. 
 .But Mam'selle shows the same symptoms that Madame De
 
 220 THE POMFRET MYSTEKY. 
 
 Castro had the symptoms of the same generations from 
 some common ancestor/' 
 
 " Is Madame De Castro, then, of the same age as Char- 
 lotte." 
 
 "Ah, no, Madame ! She is as an elderly lady, and her 
 hair is not like the beautiful, silken, brown hair of Mam'- 
 selle, but it is as white as the driven snow. But, Madame 
 knows that people may be of the same generation, though 
 of different ages, and Madame has lived an out-of-door life, 
 so that the disease did not manifest itself so quickly, but 
 Mam'selle has been tasking her eyes by reading music." 
 
 " This Madame De Castro," Charlotte interposed; " did 
 she see again;*" 
 
 "Ah, she can see now one hour each day the rest of 
 the time her eyes must yet remain in darkness. But she 
 will see again all right one year more and she will see bet- 
 ter than she ever did." 
 
 " Do you think it will be so with me?" 
 
 " Yes ! We must have one little operation that will not 
 be very painful, and then a long siege of darkness, and at 
 the end you will see so well that you will think you were 
 blind all your life before." 
 
 So the operation was performed, and Charlotte's eyes were 
 bound and she was led into a darkened room, and was to 
 see no ray of light for two long months. 
 
 During these months Mrs. Mason was not idle. She saw 
 Madame De Castro and scrutinized her carefully, hoping to 
 find some resemblance to Charlotte, for she had the hope 
 that this disease might give some clue to Charlotte's parent- 
 age. But they were totally unlike in appearance, and Mrs. 
 Mason's hopes fell to the ground. But she wrote on to 
 America and had a full account of the finding of Charlotte 
 prepared and verified bj James Patrick Ifierck and his 
 wife,
 
 A STRAJTGE DISEASE. 221 
 
 Charlotte was lonely during her long confinement in the 
 darkened room indeed how could it be otherwise. Mrs. 
 Mason gave her four hours a day, and Baron Von Else spent 
 an hour with her, but had she not been permitted to use 
 her voice she would have fallen ill of weariness. 
 
 But of all the events of the long dark hours she began to 
 look forward to the oculist's visits as the most pleasant, and 
 when he had gone it seemed to her that he took the pleasure 
 of the day away with him. She did not for a moment think 
 of loving him. She had pictured him in her mind as an 
 elderly, white-haired man, probably with a wife and a grown- 
 up family. It never occurred to her that so famous a man 
 as he was could be young and she was too blind to see 
 with her own eyes what his personal appearance was like. 
 Yet Baron Von Else was scarcely more than thirty years of 
 age, tall and handsome, clever and renowned. 
 
 But with Von Else himself the case was different. He 
 was not blind to the beauty of this young girl any more than 
 he was deaf to the charm of her voice. Yet he was not in 
 love with her, as he frankly confessed to himself, when 
 sometimes he attempted to analyze his liking for her. The 
 sensation he was experiencing was a curious blending of ad- 
 miration for her personality and interest in her disease, but 
 it was by no means the same as he felt for Madame De 
 Castro. 
 
 He had entered into the lives of both these woman in the 
 dual capacity of friend and physician. The very rare dis- 
 ease with which each was afflicted, and the fact that he 
 alone had the skill necessary to cure it, seemed to bind all 
 three of them with a strong tie. The very doubt which ex- 
 isted as to the kinship of his two patients added interest to 
 their cases, and though he never believed that kinship did 
 not exist, yet possibly it might not, and if so then it would 
 be still more interesting to watch a case of individual de-
 
 222 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 velopment of the disease. Then, too, he was not inappi'e- 
 ciative of the romance of the possibility that some blood con- 
 nection might be established through the simultaneous de- 
 velopment of the disease. 
 
 The time 1 drew near when Charlotte was to be permitted 
 to spend half an hour in the light of day not the full blaze 
 of the noonday sun, but the mellowed twilight of a room 
 when the shades are drawn. A pleasant little reception 
 had been arranged for her, and she looked forward with 
 pleasurable anticipation to seeing the faces of the friends 
 whose voices she had come to know so well during her im- 
 prisonment. The day came at last, and she heard with joy 
 the well-known footsteps ascending the stairs, and she knew 
 that in a few minutes Baron Von Else would remove the 
 bandage from her eyes. He greeted her kindly as he en- 
 tered and did not keep her long in suspense, but stepping 
 to her side, relieved her of the bandage, and she saw. 
 
 She turned to thank him, but started back in astonish- 
 ment, for she could not believe that this strong, young man 
 was the oculist. 
 
 He laughed as he saw her amazement, "Confess now, 
 mam'selle," he said in his merry, lighted-hearted tones, 
 " confess that you mistook me for an elderly, white-haired 
 old man." 
 
 His merriment was infectious and she too laughed as she 
 replied: " Yes, that is true, but all the same I thank you 
 for having cured me." 
 
 "Ah, you will have many more hours of darkness before 
 you are cured," he responded. " Kemember, that you have 
 now only half an hour of sunlight. Ah!" 
 
 This last exclamation was elicited by the action of Madame 
 De Castro, who had risen from her seat and was now stand- 
 ing staring at Charlotte, with arms upstretched as if 
 warding off a blow.
 
 "STEPPING TO HER SIDE, HE BELIEVED HEK OP THE BANDAGE, AND SHE SAW." 
 
 Page 222.
 
 224 THE POSIFRET 3IYSTERY. 
 
 "Has tli e dead risen?" she exclaimed in tremulous ac- 
 cents. " Has the grave given up the youth and beauty 
 which it once claimed as its own ? " 
 
 She tottered and would have fallen had not the doctor 
 rushed to her assistance and placed her on the sofa, while 
 Charlotte knelt by her side and exclaimed: 
 
 " It is no ghost, dear Madame De Castro. It is I Char- 
 lotte Nierck surely you know me ! " 
 
 " I have done you no wrong," again cried the shuddering 
 woman; ' ' why do you rise after so many years to haunt me ? " 
 
 " Did I not tell you/' said the doctor to Mrs. Mason, 
 when Madame De Castro was slowly recovering under Char- 
 lotte's assiduous attentions " Did I not tell you that there 
 was some relationship between them." 
 
 " There is a mystery," Mrs. Mason replied. " God grant 
 that it be solved." 
 
 Madame De Castro soon recovered her composure and sit- 
 ting up said to Charlotte: 
 
 " Tell me, my child, who were your parents?" 
 
 "Alas, Madame," Charlotte answered, "I do not know. 
 Kind people adopted me when I was very young." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 " Some thirty years ago." 
 
 " I have all the details," said Mrs. Mason, and leaving 
 the room for a few minutes she returned with the statement 
 of the Niercks in her hand. 
 
 " I must think ! I must think ! " Madame De Castro said. 
 " I have thought but I cannot tell what. I must be 
 alone and think." 
 
 " It is well," the oculist said, stepping forward: " This 
 agitation is not beneficial for either of you. Mam'selle, I 
 will now replace your bandage. Madame, I shall be happy 
 to escort you to your carriage. To-morrow at this hour we 
 will all meet here again."
 
 SKEINS UNTANGLED. 225 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 SKEINS UNTANGLED. 
 
 WHEN Madame De Castro was able to meet Charlotte once 
 more she told the following history of her life. 
 
 " I shall have to tell you," she said, " a part of my own 
 history which I have heretofore hidden from all the world. 
 I would hide it now from you if I could, but by telling it I 
 can repair a great wrong done to Charlotte when she was 
 an infant a wrong which I had no part in and did not 
 know of until after it had been committed/' 
 
 Her listeners pledged themselves to secresy, and she con- 
 tinued: 
 
 " I was born a slave. My mother was a quadroon girl, 
 nearly white, in the family named Vance in Louisiana. 
 Even now I can remember her as a very handsome woman. 
 I have every reason to think that her master was my father, 
 though I know nothing about it, and my mother never men- 
 tioned the subject to me. I lived on the plantation until 
 I was seventeen years old, as the maid of a granddaughter 
 of old Mr. Vance, and of my early days I have little recol- 
 lection except that they were far pleasanter than fell to the 
 lot of most slave children, and that my young mistress was 
 kind and considerate. 
 
 " When I was sixteen years old I was engaged to a young 
 house-servant a slave like myself and we were to be mar- 
 ried in the next year. But before the time came my mis- 
 tress's brother arrived at the plantation and all my life was 
 changed. He was only a few years older than my mistress, 
 and as I was a pretty girl, he took a fancy to me. I liked 
 him well enough, but I encouraged him so as to make my
 
 226 THE POMFEET MYSTERY. 
 
 lover jealous and to give myself importance in the eyes of 
 the other slaves. So when my young master bid me meet 
 him in the shubbery about the house one night, I consented, 
 meaning no harm, and foolishly I told my lover of the ap- 
 pointment. He was violent and insisted that I should not 
 go, but I was delighted at hi? jealousy and I went. He fol- 
 lowed me, and when my young master met me he came up 
 and begged him to send me home. But my master would 
 not, and only ordered him away, and when he did not go 
 struck him with his cane. 
 
 " Then Sunbeam that was my lover's name, struck him 
 back, and I screamed, and the servants and the overseer 
 and old Mr. Vance came running to the spot. They took 
 poor Sunbeam and whipped him until he fainted, and they 
 took me although I declare I was guiltless of all intention 
 to do harm they took me and locked me up in a sort of 
 prison for refractory negroes, and the next day I heard that 
 we were both to be sold. 
 
 " But that night Sunbeam came to my prison and let me 
 out and together we ran away. We reached the river at a 
 place where Sunbeam knew there was a boat hidden, and we 
 crossed on that and traveled on all night until day broke. 
 Then we hid in the cane-brake until it was night again, 
 guiding ourselves by the stars. How long we were journey- 
 ing in this way I cannot remember. We had brought a 
 little food with us, and that lasted us for the first two or 
 three days, after that was gone we lived on what we could 
 find in the swamps and streams. So we journeyed on, always 
 traveling by night and hiding by day, until we knew by the 
 language of those who passed our hiding place by the road- 
 side that we were in a land where English was not spoken, 
 and we supposed that we had reached Mexico, which had 
 been our destination when we set out. 
 
 " We were still near the frontier line, however, and we
 
 SKELN'S UNTANGLED. 227 
 
 did not dare to show ourselves, lest we should be captured 
 and sent back, and so we continued to go southward by night 
 until we were a long way from home, and thought that we 
 might show ourselves. 
 
 " We could not make the people understand what we 
 said, but at last by signs we got them to know that we 
 wanted work, and at last Sunbeam got some work to do 
 among the horses, and I was given some work in the house. 
 "We got no pay for what we did, but we learned to speak 
 the language. 
 
 " We stayed there until the war with the revolted prov- 
 inces and with Texas broke out, and that threw everything 
 into confusion and there was no more work for us to do. 
 
 " The workmen all about us formed a troop of cavalry and 
 elected Sunbeam their commander. Way up among the 
 mountains there was a deserted house. The paths leading 
 to it were known only to a few herdsmen, and that they 
 made their rendezvous, and there I and the other women 
 stayed while they went off on their journeys. 
 
 " Ah, me! I fear that they were little better than rob- 
 bers and murderers, for they often brought booty that they 
 could not have honestly come by, and if they brought back 
 prisoners it was only to hold them for ransom. But I 
 knew that Sunbeam was getting rich all the while, and that 
 there was no longer any danger of our being recaptured as 
 slaves, so I did not mind much. Ah, no one who has not 
 been a slave can know the pleasure of being free ! 
 
 " It was in the time afterwards that my husband 
 still burning for revenge for his whipping left me for a 
 long while on a scheme of vengeance I did not know what 
 it was until long afterwards even if I had known of it then 
 perhaps I should not have been able to prevent it but I 
 should have tried ah, yes, I should have tried. Somehow 
 he had learned that his old master Laurie had been married 
 and that a daughter had been born to him.
 
 228 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 " It was on the night before his death that Sunheam con- 
 fessed all this to me when he was about to start upon a new 
 expedition somehow he had a presentiment that he would 
 never return, and so he put all his money and the spoils of 
 his raids into my hands for safe keeping and told me what 
 before he had kept secret. 
 
 " He had gone back to New Orleans, and watching his 
 chance had stolen Laurie Vance's daughter, and then, not 
 daring to bring her to me, not knowing what I could do 
 with her thinking, I hope, that I might send her back 
 and then he had taken her to New York to leave her there 
 he said, with good people. 
 
 " It was after he came back that the United States troops 
 invaded Mexico, and then he was very busy. I had grown 
 used to my life, and when I was discontented I had only to 
 think that I was free, and that would bring content back 
 
 " I need not tell what deeds of blood and shame I wit- 
 nessed in our retreat among the mountains. I grew so ac- 
 customed to them that I did not mind them much, until one 
 day the troops brought home a prisoner a United States 
 officer and when taken from his horse and put into the 
 hut that served us as a prison I recognized him, and knew 
 that he was Laurence Vance. 
 
 " I could do nothing for him then, but I kept my knowl- 
 edge of him to myself and waited patiently until I should 
 see a chance to help him. I did not have to wait long. 
 Sunbeam bought him from the troop when his ransom had 
 been fixed bought him, who had been his master, as a slave. 
 
 " I know not what scheme of vengeance Sunbeam had in 
 his own mind, but after this purchase the troop left the 
 prison unguarded and I could get access to the prisoner. 
 
 " I knew that I had no time to lose if I would rescue 
 him, and so the next night the night after his purchase
 
 SKEINS UNTANGLED. 229 
 
 I stole to the prison and unbarred the door. I had horses 
 ready, and Laurie, mounted on one of them, fled in safety 
 to the United States camp. 
 
 " When Sunbeam learned the next morning that his pris- 
 oner had escaped, he was furious; and it was then, while the 
 troop were getting ready to pursue, that he told me who 
 his prisoner was, and how his daughter had been stolen. 
 
 " It was three days afterwards that a few of the troop 
 rode back and told me how they had been surprised by the 
 United States cavalry, and how Sunbeam was dead, but it 
 was not until long years afterwards that I learned that Lau- 
 rence Vance had died also. 
 
 " I did not wish to stay in Mexico after that, but it was 
 not until after peace had been declared that I was able to 
 leave. Then I came to Paris, and the money and property 
 which I had enabled me to live in comfort. 
 
 " I did not dare to go back to the United States, but I 
 sent over to agents and they made every effort to trace the 
 child that had been stolen, but no one could find her. I 
 received back from America news about the Vances, and 
 learned that old Mr. Vance was dead had been blind be- 
 fore he died. 
 
 " Then in Paris I met Seflor De Castro and married him. 
 He was an old man and rich, and he died shortly afterwards, 
 leaving all his money to me. I have lived in Europe all my 
 life since, though they tell me that it would be safe for any 
 one now to go to the United States. 
 
 "All the Vances have strong family likenesses, and when 
 I met Mr. Thomas Vance and his son years ago in France I 
 knew who he was as soon as I first looked at him. But I 
 did not make myself known to him. How could I, when I 
 did not wish any one to know that I had been a slave. 
 
 " Then, when I came here to consult Baron Von Else 
 about my eyes, and he told me that my disease was an in-
 
 230 THE POMFKET MYSTERY. 
 
 herited one, I remembered the story that old Mr. Vance 
 had been my father, and I told the doctor that he was right, 
 that I had inherited the disease from my father. 
 
 " I had not heard anything from America for a long while 
 until within a year or two, when I was told that a rich Mrs. 
 Vance was making inquiries about the family and had adver- 
 tised for information about the lost child. I wanted to write 
 to her, but I could not without disclosing my history, and 
 that I could not do. 
 
 " But when I saw you, Mam'selle Nierck, I knew that you 
 were a Vance. You were the exact image of my young 
 mistress when she was younger than you." 
 
 The ladies were all in tears before Madame De Castro had 
 completed her disclosure, and the doctor alone had dry eyes. 
 
 "It is so, then ! " he cried. " You did indeed inherit 
 the disease from the same person. I knew it must be so ! 
 I knew it ! I knew it ! Madame's father had the same 
 trouble, she inherited it from him. He was your grandfather, 
 and you also inherited it from him. There can be no de- 
 ception in Nature if only we read her aright, and I knew 
 that it must be so." 
 
 " I cannot understand it ! " Charlotte said. "It is so 
 strange to have the whole past so suddenly disclosed to me." 
 
 " Will you take this seat by me, child, and let me tell 
 you more about your family ? You have a brother living 
 yet, perhaps somewhere in America unless indeed the Mrs. 
 Vance should be his widow and he be dead." 
 
 Then, while Charlotte took her seat by the side of Madame 
 De Castro and she poured into willing ears all that she re- 
 membered or had learned about the Vances, Mrs. Mason 
 and Baron Von Else carried on a low conversation at an- 
 other end of the room.
 
 THE END. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 IT would be tedious to detail all the various steps that 
 were taken by Charlotte and her friends to communicate 
 with Ethel. Suffice it to say that their letters went first to 
 America and thence followed her across the ocean. 
 
 They found her in Paris, and it was several days before 
 she could learn the present location of Charlotte. At last, 
 however, she was put in possession of all the facts, and she 
 in turn had told all of her own story which she cared to tell 
 disclosing just enough that they might perceive the justice 
 of her intentions. 
 
 Nothing remained, therefore, but to hand over to Char- 
 lotte the fortune which remained. 
 
 Before she had left America, Ethel had posted herself as 
 to the law on this subject. The fortune was her own. The 
 law gave it to her absolutely and she had the right to give 
 it to anyone she chose. There was no need of going to law 
 about it no need of asking the intervention of the lawyers 
 she could and she did give it all to Charlotte. 
 
 Need it be said what Charlotte did with her money? 
 James Patrick Merck and his wife were provided for. Lit- 
 tle James, as she still called him, though he was a stalwart 
 man now, received capital enough to make him full partner 
 in the house where he had so long been a clerk. As for 
 Charlotte herself, she revisited the scenes of her family, and 
 when Mrs. Mason's death left her again alone in the world, 
 she went to Pomfret to live with Ethel. 
 
 And there Benny Moore saw her saw her and loved her
 
 232 THE POMFRET MYSTERY. 
 
 not as he had loved Ethel in the old days, for a true man 
 never loves twice with the fervor of his first love but loved 
 her deeply and truly; and when she returned his love, and 
 married him, he gave up the practice of the law and retired 
 to the farm at Pomf ret. 
 
 In the old house next to the Pomfret Bank Ethel still 
 lives, a white-haired woman, aged before her time. Her 
 face bears the marks of sorrow and suffering, but her smile 
 is like the smile of an angel and the expression of her face 
 is peace. To her go all those in trouble, in sorrow or in 
 distress, and she is ever busy with good deeds, and a deep 
 calm has followed the storms and tempests of her life. 
 
 Out at the Woodside farm, Benny Moore still lives, a grave, 
 silent man. His wife and merry children cast the broad, 
 mellow sunshine of happiness about his life. 
 
 But the merriest times that the merry children have, are 
 when they are grouped around the fire on a winter's night, 
 listening to some cherished tale told by "Aunt Ethel."