Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1888-08-31
A MISSING LINK.
By JAMES FRANKLIN FITS.

1
all people, and there are two things that
have mysti6ed me from an early period
of my life, past all explanation.
Whether the astounding discovery that
I have just made in this land, three
THOUSAND miles from home, shall &C.
count for them, the reader may judge.
For myself, plain, practical man that I
am, I start back from the awful posi-
bilities suggested by such an explana-
ton, d though I had glanced through
a half opened door into the mysteries of
anotht r wo.ld.
In the passport with which I Travelled
on the continent three years ago for the
great Liverpool house of which I am
confidential clerk and accountant, am
thus Jet down:
"Rbbert Chalmers, Scotchman. Age,
s3; complexion and hair, light; eyes,
blue; height, SIS; weight, AS; occupa-
ton, clerk. Travels on business"
Nothing extraordinary about that.
suppose two or three hundred of my
countrymen might be found in Liver
pool answering to this catalogue, bar
ring the name. And there is nothing
unusual about me, either. More than
ten years experience has made Of me a
mere business machine. I am devoted
to the pen; &. s. p, merchandise,
debit and credit are my masters. The
atmosphere of the counting-house is
necessary to my existence. In brief,
Bob Chalmers is known to his en-
ployers and to his friends as a prosy,
plodding, industrious fellow and COM
petent man of business.
Inever told any of them that I was
haunted. Nor have I dared to tell my
young wife. The thing is SO perfectly
inconsistent with my whole life and
character, with myself, in short, that
such confession would be regarded as
sign of insanity. So I have always
kept this trouble to myself. 1t has
wearied and vexed me; but I have not
dared speak of it.
Haunted is the only word can use
to designate it.
Not that I have had ghostly visitants.
I sleep as sound as any man in the
United Kingdom. Ny appetite is, and
always has been, remarkably good.
The things that have continually come
to me are name and visio71.
The name of Charles Gardeau.
An unusual name. French, I should
think.
never heard it spoken; never read
it anywhere, in print, or in writing,
nor knew any person who bore it.
Where picked it up has been just as
great an enigma to me as why it should
occur to me so often. That odious
name!- odious to me, assuredly. It has
possessed me, as the Old Man of the
Sea did Sinbad. 1t has rung in my
ears. It has come between me and the
great ledgers, so that sometimes have
had to take turn in the Office to
get rid of the illusion that
Charles Gardeau was written
in great round characters all
over the page. And once, in my inn
patience, to the amazement and horror
of my staid Presbyterian employer, ]
gave vent to my feelings in the ejacula-
ton, "Whoever he is, may the devil
take him!"
"And the vision?" .-...
I cannot be certain but that it first
came to me in dream. If so, never
was dream so startling, so life-like.
Whether it began in my sleep or not,
certain it is that thereafter my waking
hours were alive with it, and that the
grand and terrible scene repeated it.
self before my eyes again and again.
Description is useless; I can only
outline it.
The vision was of myself, in row.
boat, on broad river, at anchor by a
large island, fishing. The time was
near sunset; I must go home. The
stone that held my boat On the shallow
water was taken in, I laid to the oars,
and was soon half across the great
stream. One of the thole-pins broke,
and the oar few from my hand. The
current was swift, and it doated quickly
beyond my reach. I tried to use the
other oar as scull, but could not make
it work. The boat went down with the
current. I knew my danger, and
shouted and waved my hat for help.