Orleans independent standard. [volume] (Irasburgh, Vt.) 1856-1871, 1857-07-10

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nation of his affairs. What goods be
had left had been seized, but he had con-
cealed thousand dollars in specie in
box buried in the cellar, on the night
when fear ofsudden arrest for fraud had
caused him to decamp. Since then he
had become a wanderer, not daring to re-
turn, and now sickness and destitution |
had come to ayenge his creditors on him.
He described where he had placed the
box, and with his dying breath urged
my brother to secure it and give it to those
he had defrauded, in partial atonement
for the wrong. My brother promised
but on coming home he told me the story,
and said that poverty had made the prize
too tempting.
4" You will not use the money your
SELF" said 1. "God never prospers the
dishonest"
Yes he does" said John angrily. If
he did not there wouldn't be so many rich
people, and the poor would get their
own"
l told him the money wasn't his own,
but he wouldn't listen to me, and that
very day he brought home with him two
rough-looking men, and he agreed to give
them share if they would aid him in
getting the money that night. They
sent out for drink, and caroused and
awore, and when John was asleep I
heard them in another room, say how
much better it would be, when he got the
money, to kill him and share it between
them. When John awoke / tried to
pursuade him not to 60, but he was furi-
GUS and would not listen, and so I came
, to you as my only resource. o, if had
only waited and given the ALARM" con-
cluded my wife, moaning aloud, "wha
, happened would not have happened
T But I thought you would be there to pre-
vent it."
Twas astonished at this disclosure, anC
now suspected that the man who gav'
the false alarm must have been one 0
e the accomplices-
e Why didn't you appear as witnes
: against the men % I asked.
it 81 didn't know what might happen t
I me, and was afraid. The accounts i
y the papers frightened me. But I re
membered your name in the reports, an
: when we became acquainted by chance
I recognized you, but feared to tell yol
le not knowing what you'd think of m,
ID But now you know all. 1t has been
in sad secret to keep, and often when yo
have spoken of the murder, l longed
es tell you it was my poor brother job
Hagner who was murdered.
), I comforted her as well as could, an
asked her if she knew the mems names
!, but she said she had never known, thoue
lg she remembered their having said the
had been sailors in the navy, and 81
r thought at the time that they might ha'
OF shipped in a sloop-ofwar, which, short
'e after the murder, had put to sea on
re three years cruise. But of this, of cour
there was no certainty.
Us My wife seemed greatly relieved VIII
ne she had revealed the secret to me, anC
concluded that for a time at any rate,
ou would let the matter rest between US
ian l saw no good that could come frc
in making it public fact.
der Not long after our marriage ag'
tch became wa.chman, traversing the sa
old beat | believe | know every ST
the in it. Never did 1 pass the old store
hat which still remains unoccupied, the owl
low still remained abroad, and having no ag
for letting it-without an unpleas
in sensation. Sometimes ! felt curious
she enter and search the premises, to see
the money was still there; but | was
said strained by the thought Of the wor
the consciousness, and that my curio
might be construed injuriously. So ]
or ] it alone altogether.
e. One evening, for all the world just 5
ond, an evening as that when my wife
: at spoke to me, was standing in I
hen doorway, next to number 96, and th
and ing of the fact that sloop-of-war's c
What had been discharged that very day,
Or l wondering whether the rogues had
than among them, when heard the soun
old approaching feet, and looking out,
taste remarking that the two men approac
appeared to be sailors, "a little in fol
that | shrank back into the darkness and
at tened.
the When they got abreast ofthe store
hor- said to the other in a low tone g
from eyes, Tom, if there aren't the very
Iuan- store, looking as if nobody had gone
e;tv :. e.o,,, tlat .;roa to this = And ma