The Arkansaw traveler., 1886-01-02
ANGEL WINGS
lRxeAaarAl

lExeAaAge.l Many years ago, the community of certain hamlet m tne south oi France was startled by . crime indeed in their quiet, agricultural district. A wealthy farmer was found dead at early morning within hundred yards of his own house He had been killed by blows administered by heavy stake. which lay near the body covered with blood l; and his pockets had been rified of their contents, including a considerable sum of money which he was known to have received the previous evening for some sheep sold by him in the neighboring market town. When the awe and excitement created by this event had subsided little, every exe1tion was made by the authorities to ferret out the perpeuator of the crime. A reward was offered tor the discovery of the murderer, proclamation of which bounty was made for several successive Sundays at the church door. At last some disclosures were m ade. duplicating young man named Laroche-a strip ling, eighteen years of age.
 The person who brought the charge against young Laroche was man of the name of LAndry-a stranger in the dis trict, but who had lately been appointed by the lord of the manor as one of the keepers of game preserves. Landry tes- ti6ed that he had seen Laroche cutting a stake from the hedge on the afternoon previous to the murder, and that he had reproved him for it, and, taking the stake rom him, had stuck 1t on the bank of the hedge at a particular spot. The stake was the same one found lying near the body of the farmer. Landry could swear to it, because. alter taking it from La roche, he had niched it in a particular way with his penkRife.
 Now it so happened that the murdered farmer had many and influential friends, while Laroche had but few therefore La- roche was convicted of murder, and sen fenced to be hanged on a certain day, and at a certain place; until which time he was placed for sate- keeping in the lail of the district-the third floor of large stone building, the lower part ot which was a mill.
 The prison consisted of a single apart. ment, lighted by a small window, at the height of about sixteen feet from the floor. The side of the building from which the window looked ran sheer down to the water of dark, deep river which creeps laz,ly by the mill, but quickened the pace little lower down, until it gradually be- came rushing torrent, leaping wildly on to its fall over perpendicular ledge Of rocks. Bodies carried over the falls were said never to have been recovered; and it was fixed notion among the country people that there was suctional force below, by which everything falling into it was carried dewn into the unexplored abysses of the earth.
 It was the day before that fixed for the execution of young Laroche, and the priest of the parish, Father Allard by name, had been left alone with the pris- oner, in order to prepare him, by the con- solation of religion, for his approaching doom. To his words of comfort Lsroche listened with humility and silence, until the good father began to dilate upon his chances of forgiveness in the next world for the great crime committed by him. Then the prisoner electrified him by de- claring his perfect innocence oi the crime "a position which he meant 10 maintain, he said, with his latest breath.
 To be brief, the youth of the prisoner, his asseverations of his innocence, and wavering doubt of his guilt, which had all
  wrought upon that worthy man that he at last copsented to commit himself to a plan for giving the prisoner a chance of escape, If not from death, at least from the ignominy of dying by the hand of the accursed hangman.
 "lf die by the gallows, most reverend fathet,' said the young man, ca grea, sorrow will some day fall upon all con- cerned in my death. The real murderer is sure to be discovered, sooner or later and the just retribution of heaven will pursue my murderers. Aid me to escape rather than risk great stain upon your conscience. Stand upon this chair, which l place upon the table, thus; and then, by mounting upon your shoulders, can reach the window and drop from it."
 But the river below"
 q can swim like an otter, and, at any rate, it is better to be drowned than hanged"
 Convinced of the young mans inno- cence, Father Allard consented to aid him in his escape. A moment sufficed to carry the plan into execution. The prisoner gained the window and disap- peared.
 Parading, in a struggling way, outside the building weot one of the minor oftl- cers Of justice "a solid peasant, who had been placed there by way of sentry, and who at this moment happened to be look. ing toward the river wall of the mill. His sight nearly let him, as he atterward stated, when he saw man drop from the jail window, s.rke on to a platform tha, protruded from doorway in the second story, and rebounding from that, fall into the water with heavy plunge, reappearing at intervals, until he was carried away into the rapids oelo :.
 The alarm vas at once given. Village officials rushed 10 the priso n-room, where they found Father Allard alone, seated on